Western Union to Offer Mobile Phone Money Transfers
Silver, S.

Western Union has partnered with RadioShack, a consumer electronics retailer, and Trumpet Mobile, a small wireless company, to offer a service that will enable people to send money through their cellphones. The service is aimed at immigrants in the US who regularly send money to family members in their native countries. Many of these immigrants do not have bank accounts and send the money by taking cash to a transfer service such as Western Union or a host of other firms.

Western Union, which already has a big share of the US$300 billion global money-transfer market, hopes that the cellphone service will bring in new clients and encourage existing customers to use it for a broader range of money transfers including paying utility bills and sending money domestically. People without bank accounts can now pay these bills in a variety of ways, including at convenience stores.

To use the service, people need to sign up for a Trumpet prepaid phone at a RadioShack store. Customers can then load up to US$200 on their phones for cash transfer via Western Union's network either within the US or internationally.

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• Text Messaging Facility for Locating MFIs Launched in the Philippines (14 Jul 2007)

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