Announcing the innovative new eSwitchKit!

EverythingCU.com is thrilled to announce an innovative new breakthrough in making it easy for your new members to switch their previous accounts over to your CU! Our new eSwitchKit makes switching incredibly easy via secure email and organized with a personalized online checklist that both your member and your credit union can monitor for real-time status updates.

Making the switch to your credit union has never been easier with our new eSwitchKit!

See for yourself how easy and convenient it is by trying out the Demo!

The eSwitchKit makes it easy for your member (or your MSRs to help your members) switch their previous accounts over to your credit union. The member’s information only needs to be entered one time, and the correct information is then sent to each vendor involved in the process, including Employer for Direct Deposit, previous Financial Institution for close account instructions, and for every ACH/Automatic Payment vendor as well as any vendors making automatic withdrawals via Debit Card.

The member is in control every step of the way, being able to decide which of these organizations are to receive account numbers, which organizations are to receive secure email communications, and which organizations are to receive printed and mailed letters.

• The most innovative switch kit in the industry brings the member an active, real time checklist with email alerts keeping the process top of mind and organized
• The member and credit union can access a Switching Checklist providing an up-to-the-second look at each step of the switch
• Member is alerted via email whenever a vendor responds with switching updates
• Full admin controls enables you to help your members through any sticking points
• SSAE 16 compliance and industry-standard 128-bit encryption
• Vendors can send messages back to the member in regards to switch status and details
• The eSwitchKit is the latest innovation from the same company that brought you the original Online Switch Kit in 2004 and Premium Online Switch Kit in 2011. More than 100 CUs nationwide employ these Switch Kits that have helped more than 23,000 members switch to their credit union

If you are currently using the Original or Premium Switch Kit and would like to upgrade, please contact me for your prorated upgrade pricing; via email: morriss@everythingcu.com or call me direct at 413-535-0621. For more information about the eSwitchKit or to place an order, visit the eSwitchKit Info/Sales page.

Initial feedback has been positive; feel free to let us know your thoughts and comments about this new concept in helping members make the switch to your CU!

Happy switching!

Geolocation and Personal Safety

I had the privilege of facilitating a session on Geolocation for PodCamp Boston 5 last weekend. The conversation was excellent, and I met a lot of great people there. The slide deck is available on SlideShare.net.

A couple weeks ago, I had a great conversation with Gene Blishen, President of Mt. Lehman Credit Union in BC, near Vancouver, on the CU Water Cooler on the potential uses of geolocation in the financial arena.

With Gowalla and Foursquare becoming increasingly popular, and new services such as SCVNGR and Topguest coming into their own, it’s easy to get caught up in the check-in mania.

But at sessions such as PodCamp, and in private conversations, it’s easy to lose the voice of many people who declare, “I will never even sign up for a check-in service because it feels too unsafe.”

Feelings such as these, which are far from a minority point of view, often get overlooked or dismissed by those in geolocation for whom personal safety is not a consideration. These feelings, combined with the recent tragedy of the murders of two real estate agents in Ohio got me thinking about geolocation from the reverse point of view: What if we could use geolocation to make people SAFER?

So I did some research (okay, I looked up “Personal Safety” in the iPhone app store), and discovered that there ARE a handful of iPhone apps that are doing just that, making people MORE safe, and using geolocation technology for that purpose.

Here’s a quick rundown of four:

iWitness – This app appears pretty robust. Not only can you use it send either a safety alert or medical alert, you can also set up a group of up to 16 friends and colleagues who will get an email when you activate the distress call. Your location is automatically included in the distress notification. Another feature is record mode where it will send video and audio of your current situation to the company’s servers. This could be potentially useful in locating the owner in a kidnapping situation.

Rescue – This app is also robust, offering a number of safety features such as auto-detecting what country you are in so that the emergency phone number (911 in the U.S. but different in other countries) is immediately activated with use. Your GPS location, including Google Map link, and phone number is sent to emergency responders when activated. Rescue also puts the iPhone into an alarm state, setting off an audio and visual alarms on the device itself. This company’s web site features two videos which explain how to personalize and use this app.

Silent Bodyguard – Is similar to Rescue, except that instead of the device going off, it remains silent and innocuous while sending out distress emails, texts, tweets and Facebook updates, informing the contacts that the owner is in trouble, and sending the location information as well. I’d be interested if folks in law enforcement have opinions or research on whether silent or full-alarm is the way to go. I bet it probably depends on the situation. My guess is that it’s best to DETER people with harmful intent by making them aware that should any harm happen to the owner, a slate of people including police will be instantly notified with the owner’s current location. Perhaps a big obtrusive lapel button could be worn that says something along the lines of “Don’t mess with me, police and friends know exactly where I am.”

Safety Button – For times when someone is feeling unsafe while out and about, he/she can launch this app, and the user’s location and steps are then transmitted to the company’s servers. If the owner is then met with a dangerous situation, he/she can press the help button alerting one chosen friend with a message that includes the location.

I look forward to the GeoM conference in Boston this Monday. I hope some of these issues are addressed, but I have a feeling they won’t.