Banks Rush Into the “War of Mobile Wallet”

it is a service which combined the features of prepaid cards and transferrable Internet banking system. (image: Kobizmedia/ Korea Bizwire)

SEOUL, July 23 (Korea Bizwire) –The sense of urgency that IT companies are encroaching on the mobile payment market is making banks to competitively beef up their smartphone-based electronic commerce services and scramble into the “war of mobile wallet.”

Mobile Wallet or E-Wallet is a service that provides a convenient and technologically quick method of transferring or purchasing products from a mobile device, with money pre-charged from the bank account. In other words, it is a service which combined the features of prepaid cards and transferrable Internet banking system.

“Hana N Wallet” is a mobile wallet service of Hana Bank which allows transactions and transfers with their own pre-charged virtual currency “Cashnut.” The charged money is transferrable just by entering the recipient’s phone number and purchases can also be made with “cashnut” in Hana Bank’s affiliates as well.

Notably, the service significantly relieves the user from recharging whenever the cashnut balance is insufficient to make a purchase, by automatically charging the virtual money with the user’s balance in his bank account.

For example, when you are buying $2-worth product in one of the Hana Bank’s affiliates while you only have a dollar in your Cashnut account, one dollar will be paid with the existing Cashnut and the remaining dollar will be deducted from your bank account to complete the purchase.

Shinhan Bank’s mobile wallet service is called “Zoo Money.” Anyone who is over 14 can sign up for “Zoo Money” on a smartphone application or on the website and will be immediately granted with a virtual payment account that is linked to your Shinhan Bank account.

Like the Hana Bank’s N Wallet, Shinhan’s mobile wallet service enables to make transfers between its members just with their phone numbers and also the virtual money charged in the E-wallet is easily refundable to Shinhan’s banking account or those of other banks.

Recently launched “My Shinhan Pay” is a service akin to a debit card service, in which the purchase amount made by the banking app, “Shinhan S Bank,” is simultaneously deducted from the user’s banking account.

Industrial Bank of Korea (IBK) provides a mobile wallet service with an application called “IBK One Money.” “One Money” is chargeable by a smartphone and can be withdrawn as cash from ATMs, make mobile transactions, or be exchanged as a gift.

“One Money” is exchangeable as a gift with non-members of the service as well, can be withdrawn as cash from any IBK ATMs or IBK-affiliated ATMs in 7Eleven stores and can be used to make small-purchases.

By J. H. Kim (jhkim@koreabizwire.com)