Fidelity to market PhoneCharge bill payment service
Fidelity National Financial, Inc. (NYSE: FNF), a Fortune 500 provider of products and outsourced services and solutions to financial institutions and the real estate industry, and its Fidelity Information Services ("Fidelity") division announce an agreement with PhoneCharge, Inc., an electronic bill payment company, to co-market a suite of electronic bill pay products.
0
External
This content is provided by an external author without editing by Finextra. It expresses the views and opinions of the author.
The suite is aimed at reducing infrastructure costs and streamlining the operation of payment services presently in place at companies in the automotive finance industry. By integrating access to the PhoneCharge bill payment platform via Fidelity's interface, automobile loan and lease companies will be able to streamline, upgrade and expand their payment services virtually overnight, with minimal or no capital investment.
Peter Bobley, president of PhoneCharge, says, "The Fidelity/PhoneCharge strategic relationship will rapidly bring a much needed upgrade to automotive finance operations. Companies will be able to dramatically reduce overhead costs, lower electronic cheque returns, and for the first time offer consumers the opportunity of making their motor and recreational vehicle payments with a debit card."
Access to the PhoneCharge bill pay platform via Fidelity will enable consumers to pay their motor and recreational vehicle payments by credit card, debit card or electronic cheque via phone or the Internet. An integrated customer service program provides access to complete customer records, and a sophisticated and dependable Interactive Voice Response (IVR) element is designed to reduce live operator expense or upgrade existing IVR platforms.
Select automotive finance companies currently offer payment by credit card and, by extension of Visa and MasterCard, debit cards payments processed at a cost of approximately 2%. Companies will now benefit from a greatly reduced fixed rate through the Pulse, Star and NYCE Electronic Funds Transfer networks. One of the most effective features of the suite of bill payment services offered by Fidelity and PhoneCharge is a patent pending system known as PhoneCharge Bureau of Investigation, or PBI, which has demonstrably lowered electronic cheque returns by as much as 60%.