Banks switch to any time mobile transaction

After automated teller machine (ATM) and internet, banking transactions are set to migrate to mobile phone. From providing balance information and account alerts, banks with the help of IT companies have developed applications that now allow customers to make changes in their investment portfolios, purchase mutual funds and facilitate peer-to-peer payments. With over 250 million mobile subscribers in the country, the IT developers are hoping such applications become the preferred mode of transacting in the coming years. While mobile technology is evolved enough to allow cash remittances across users, RBI does not allow non-banks to provide money transfer services. This provides a great opportunity for banks to partner mobile companies and provide such services. All the transactions happen over SMS, but they use a security feature called Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD), a technology unique to GSM. USSD doesn’t allow the sent messages to be saved onto the phones, and hence will guard the customer’s details in case of loss or theft of the phone, according to mChek CEO Sanjay Swamy. Paymate, another mobile solutions provider, has tied up with two banks for peer-to-peer money transfer as well as peer-to-merchant money transfer, and will be announcing these tieups within the next two weeks.