Illegal skimming, copying magnetic stripe cards to produce duplicates and pillage the associated bank accounts, is a big expense for banks. That is why the implementation of the secure EMV-chip – a replacement for current magnetic stripe cards – should be standardized across Europe as quickly as possible. Luckily, we’re well under way.

Before we delve further into the advantages of the EMV-chip, first some background information.

In March 2006, European banks agreed to phase-in the EMV payment standard. Currently, European countries are currently in full swing implementing this standard in a project named Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA).

(more…)

The trend is to go simple & easy and so mobile payments using cellphones is on the rise. Our question to you: is this desirable?

In fact, this form of banking has been possible for a while now. An example: since 1998 the African company Celtel allows people to transfer phone credit to another phone using text messages. This has proven a very popular service.

(more…)

Column Evert Visser

People tend to hesitate before taking the leap to buy new products or use innovative services. Which is a pity since it causes innovative solutions to take a long time to fully bloom.

The same goes for the world of banking. Communicating with consumers and properly informing them is key.

(more…)

American credit card companies that can prove they won’t charge excessive interest rates have the future.

At least, if it’s up to president Barack Obama. He wants to target credit card companies that charge excessive rates without properly informing their clients. We really need to change the way business is done, Obama’s advisor Larry Summers stressed during a recent appearance on NBC.

(more…)

What if banks started offering tips to consumers on how to maintain or regain control over their financials? Would this help gather some long lost sympathy from customers?

Why we ask? Well, US based ING Direct is doing just that, by launching a declaration of financial independence: a new website containing 10 basic principles of smart budgetting. Among the principles are things like ‘we will spend less than we earn’, ‘we will use our home as a savings account’ and ‘we will know the cost of borrowing’.

(more…)

Offering complex loans is not done. Why? According to Ben Bernanke, chairman of the United States Federal Reserve, some banks deliberately made their credit products convoluted to increase profits.

Bernanke says that banks should strive towards the highest levels of consumer protection. However, innovation in the areas of consumer choice and access to credit continues to be important and shouldn’t be completely ignored. This because of the benefits innovative ideas can bring.

(more…)

Disruptivebanking.com visits the Albert Cuyp market in Amsterdam to see how market salesmen and the public in general feel about the credit crisis and what they think banks could do to regain their trust.

Please watch the movie below.

Another movie
In our first movie ULURU asked people in the P.C. Hooftstraat in Amsterdam what they think about banks and how they see the future. Click here to see this movie.

Banks continue wooing their customers by offering convenient digital services.

An example of this is mobile banking.

Emerging technologies allow cellphones to be used for short range wireless transactions, brainstorming the device into a credit card, debit card, membership card, rail-, bus- and airline ticket, even an electronic door key. Carrying around an oversized wallet, stuffed with a dozen different smart cards will be a thing of the past.

Another example is an ATM machine that provides additionele services, like cash deposits as well as withdrawals, and the possibility to buy insurances.

(more…)