Recently Walmart has finally entered into financial arena as it was planning since long time back. To establish its foothold in banking sector it has decided to tie a knot with Green Dot which is popular for offering pre-paid payment cards to supply checking accounts. Anyone crossing the cut off age 18 and possessing an ID that passes the check proof is entitled to have it.
These accounts offer special benefits to financially less strong customers as it there is no system of maintaining any minimum account balance, charging any fee for overdrafts including deducting any penalty for bounced checks. Whereas in Citibank they charge $ 12 for check returns and $34 for overdrafts. No doubt after the economic slow down, these low-cost alternatives will have some extra popularity than traditional bank checking accounts.
Walmart’s senior vice president Daniel Eckert has announced that these accounts would be available across the nationwide within a short period. He also mentioned it will be easy to qualify for opening these accounts for many people as the terms and conditions are simple.
Due to financial crisis, the financial situation in the western world has come to a situation where it is estimated that about 10 million households in the United States only are not using a bank account at all. To cope up with this environment, currently many banks are also relaxing their rules to attract customers with weak credit capacity. In this scenario, these Green Dot accounts, called GoBank has already become popular as Walmart’s smart initiative.
Walmart has prudently implemented this alternative banking options in the right time. These checking accounts will support many people who are now being forced to go for expensive and traditional financial transactions as they do not have checking accounts.
The company is also putting its best efforts to win back the customers in the weak economic level that is being inclined towards other low-priced retailers. As this number is quite large, Faye Landes, retail analyst at Cowen a well known investment Management group thinks it is a most sensible step.
Walmart is all set to offer affordable checking accounts,