SOURCE: CheckFree Corporation
Hawaiian Electric to Offer Customers Web-based Electronic Billing and Payment Through CheckFree E-Bill
Customers Will Be Able to Receive and Pay Electric Bills With the Click of a Mouse
ATLANTA, June 2 /PRNewswire/ -- CheckFree (Nasdaq: CKFR - news) and Hawaiian Electric Company (HECO) today announced an agreement that will enable HECO's more than 270,000 customers to receive Internet-based electronic billing and payment services beginning this fall.
''E-Bill is a big step forward in the transition from paper bills to electronic bill management and is one more example of our commitment to provide options that help meet our customers' needs,'' said T. Michael May, Hawaiian Electric Company president and chief executive officer. ''Now, HECO customers will experience greater flexibility and service, whenever and wherever they go to manage their bills on the Internet.'' He noted that customers who do not sign up for the service will continue to receive their electric bills via regular mail.
When the free service is offered this fall, Hawaiian Electric customers who visit a financial services Web site offering the CheckFree E-Bill(SM) service will be able to receive and pay their electric bills via the World Wide Web with the click of a mouse. Unlike most other online services that offer bill payment only, customers who sign up for this service will see full- color electric bills -- complete with graphics, logos and total billing details.
''Hawaiian Electric has a strong reputation for good customer service, and like our many other client companies, HECO is helping to drive consumer adoption of electronic billing and payment services,'' said Lynn Busing, CheckFree's executive vice president of Account Management.
Bill summary will be available through online banks and other financial services sites offering CheckFree's E-Bill service. Current sites offering this service include:
Bank One at bankone.com ;
Charles Schwab at mybills.com ;
First Union at mybills.com ;
Intuit's Quicken 98/99 software ;
Morgan Stanley Dean Witter at dwdean.com ;
Navy Federal Credit Union at
mybills.com ;
Prudential Securities at mybills.com ; and
CheckFree E-Bill Direct at mybills.com .
(Please note that an ''s'' is required after the ''http'' on several of the Web sites in order to access the service. This indicates that the site is secured.)
Since launching the nation's first fully integrated, market-proven electronic billing and payment solution in 1997, CheckFree has signed multi- year contracts with 49 of the nation's larger billers, including: American Electric Power, Ameren (Union Electric), AT&T, Avista Utilities (Washington Water Power), BellSouth, Boston Edison, Chase Credit Card, Chase Mortgage, Columbia Gas of Ohio, Consumers' Energy, Countrywide Home Loans Inc., Cox Communications, CUNA Mutual Group, Florida Power & Light, GPU Energy, GTE, HomeSide Lending, Illinois Power, International Billing Services (IBS), MCI WorldCom, Nevada Power, Northeast Utilities, Northern Illinois Gas (NICOR), Portland General Electric, Public Service Company of New Mexico, Small Business Administration, Southern California Edison, Southern Company, and Total System Services Inc.
In addition, Intuit is currently beta testing a new service on its Quicken.com Web site that allows consumers to receive bills online and pay those bills free of charge. This service, which utilizes the CheckFree E-Bill infrastructure, is scheduled for a full-market rollout in the third quarter of this year.
About Hawaiian Electric Company
Hawaiian Electric Company, Inc. and its subsidiaries, Maui Electric Company, Limited and Hawaii Electric Light Company, Inc., provide electricity to 95 percent of the state's 1.2 million residents on the islands of Oahu, Maui, Hawaii, Lanai and Molokai. Hawaiian Electric Company is a subsidiary of Hawaiian Electric Industries, Inc. (NYSE: HE - news), a diversified holding company that delivers essential services to the people of Hawaii.
About CheckFree
Founded in 1981, CheckFree (www.checkfree.com ), the operating subsidiary of CheckFree Holdings Corp., is the leading provider of financial electronic commerce services, software and related products. CheckFree designs, develops and markets services that enable nearly three million consumers to receive and pay bills over the Internet or electronically through a variety of bill aggregation points, including banks, brokerage firms, portals and interactive content sites on the Internet, and personal financial management (PFM) software. CheckFree's range of services and products are focused on enabling customers to make electronic payments and collections, automate paper-based recurring financial transactions and conduct secure Internet transactions.
SOURCE: CheckFree Corporation
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