>>Who made a deal with whom?
AOL, Intuit Plan Online Bills Service
By Eric Auchard
NEW YORK (Reuters) - America Online Inc. (NYSE:AOL - news), the dominant provider of consumer Internet services, and Intuit Inc. (NasdaqNM:INTU - news), the online financial services company, said on Tuesday they would offer an online service for paying household bills early next year.
The companies said the new bill management service would provide consumers with a simple way to receive, view, track and pay both electronic and traditional paper-based bills online, eliminating the tedium of check-writing and posting bills.
America Online said Intuit would become the exclusive provider of the bill tracking and payment service beginning in early 2000 on its nearly 20 million member flagship AOL online service and AOL.com, a Web link to the online service.
''Everyone has to pay bills, and this new offering will simplify the process by allowing members to receive and pay their bills from one location, and view their billing history to track expenses,'' Bob Pittman, AOL's president and chief operating officer, said in a statement.
Intuit's latest deal caps a streak of Internet deals in recent weeks that has led the Mountain View, Calif.-based company's shares to rocket 82 percent higher in the last month. Following the online bill pact, Intuit shares rose to 46, a record high, before easing to 43-13/16, up 1-15/16 from its closing price on the Nasdaq stock market Monday.
Shares of AOL initially rose above 83, then fell back to 77, down 4-1/8 on the day on the New York Stock Exchange. AOL's share price reflected a two-for-one stock split of the company's shares that became effective on Tuesday.
Separately, AOL said CompuServe, its low-priced Internet access service, had agreed with Net2Phone Inc. (NasdaqNM:NTOP - news), a provider of Internet-based telephone services, to a two-year, multi-million dollar pact in which CompuServe will promote Net2Phone phone cards to its U.S. members.
Shares of Net2Phone jumped 15 percent to 72-5/8, up 9-11/16 from Monday, following news of that deal.
By allowing both electronic and ''hard copy'' bill payments of the AOL and Intuit service distinguishes it from existing services, which allow payment either of electronic bills or scanned paper bills, or require consumers to enter payment amounts themselves.
With the new service, consumers can view their bills, transfer funds from their existing bank account and then hit a button on their computer screen to have payments made.
The companies are still seeking to decide whether billers such as utilities or credit card companies would be asked to foot the bill for the service or whether customers themselves would pay a fee, a spokesman for America Online said.
Jupiter Research has forecasted that the number of households using online bill-paying services will grow to 18 million by 2003, ten times as many as use such services today.
Consumers can also direct billers who do not provide electronic billing to send paper bills to an Intuit address where they will be scanned into electronic format.
An Intuit spokeswoman said the bill-paying system works with 18 billing services including companies such as CheckFree Corp. (NasdaqNM:CKFR - news), in which Intuit holds a 20 percent stake, and Pitney Bowes Inc. (NYSE:PBI - news). CheckFree rose 2-5/8 at 63-5/8 on the Nasdaq stock market, while Pitney Bowes gained 7/16 to 47-15/16 on the New York Stock Exchange.
Other billers that hook up into the Intuit system include Santa Clara, Calif.-based CyberBills and MyAccounts.com, a unit of Spokane, Wash.-based Output Technology Corp. and Princeton, N.J.-based Princeton eCom, the Intuit spokeswoman said.
The new service builds on an existing publishing and commerce alliance between AOL and Intuit. Intuit has been the primary source of original programming for the Personal Finance Web Channel on AOL.COM since 1998.
In addition, America Online said its recently acquired MovieFone theater ticketing service had agreed to a deal with United Artists Theater Circuit, one of the largest U.S. theater chains, that will make MovieFone the exclusive advance ticket provider for UA theater seats over the telephone or Web. |
