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Technology Stocks : CheckFree (CKFR) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Brooks Jackson who wrote (8160)	10/21/1998 9:28:00 AM
From: Benny Baga	Respond to of 8545

Thanks! I'll be listening tonight

To: Brooks Jackson who wrote (8160)	10/21/1998 9:45:00 AM
From: Ron S	Respond to of 8545

Brooks; Excellent read on innuendo and translation of unspoken areas in the conf. call; you have a better understanding of what is important than the analysts who asked mostly minutia but not big picture questions. Appreciate your reportorial abilities and understanding of the issues, please keep this up on future calls. Ron

To: Brooks Jackson who wrote (8160)	10/21/1998 10:21:00 AM
From: zuma_rk	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 8545

Brooks -- Many thanks for the recap! Should be interesting times ahead. Off topic -- this morning I mailed away the application to transfer my CKFR / Quicken account over to Intuit Services (also handled by CKFR) -- a VERY simple process, which has the added benefit of being able to setup up to 10 (!) separate checking accounts for electronic payment thru Quicken (so I sent along voided checks from my primary bank (unfortunately, Citi), as well as a check from my Schwab and E-Trade accounts. Fee is the same $9.95/per month I'm paying now. Also has the advantage of allowing me to stay connected to the web to make payments, vs. having to log off and re-dialup thru a CKFR's Compuserve connection. An interesting point -- The Intuit service is, in my opinion FAR, FAR superior to signing with an individual bank, for reasons I mentioned above, as well as for allowing the individual to be able to control his/her payee list, thereby making the ability to switch banks far more convenient. Maybe this explains why it took me sooo looonng to find the Help section in Quicken to direct me as to how to close my CF account and sign up with Intuit Services. My guess is that, like CKFR, Intuit wants to maintain bank-friendly relationships, and only offer the ISC service to those individuals whose banks don't have their own bill pay service set up. Regards, RK

To: Brooks Jackson who wrote (8160)	10/21/1998 7:41:00 PM
From: Benny Baga	Respond to of 8545

Conference Call: * Pete stated that CitiBank(New York Times) stated that "it's internal bill payment system was terrible and didn't work effectively, it wasn't cost effective. In addition Citi didn't plan to use their current bill pay platform for it's large web offering in the spring" .....I think this was something we all know, just surprised to see Citi admit it. Pete mentioned if Citi wanted to receive bills from the Nations Leading Billers, they would have to work with CheckFree. * 13 new billers signed on since the beginning of the Fiscal Year, CF also signed 4 new Financial Institutions, including the Third largest bank in New England. * Transpoint is falling further behind. One major bank and one major biller have discontinued working with TP and have turned to CF. * If Microsoft wants to compete with other portals (in bill presentment), they will have to work with CheckFree if they want to present the largest biller. * CF is not expecting banks to convert to web based solutions as fast has the banks have projected themselves (the reason for the august revision). * CF is working with non bank FI's/portals/etc., to enable the capability to receive and pay bills, for a very large distribution. I think Pete believes (as I do) that CF has a large leadership position, and the threat of banks moving from CF to TP is simply not there.

To: Brooks Jackson who wrote (8160)	10/21/1998 7:55:00 PM
From: TLindt	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 8545

However, this new direction seems to me to be much more of a gamble than the original strategy. I still think the original Bank-centered strategy will work, however. Pete is just attempting to provide some insurance, if he can. If e-bill / e-pay is a digital checkbook...and it is, then for those millions who never balance their checkbooks on a monthly basis who needs to go to a bank site to pay bills? Like they don't care what their checkbook balance is now...so why would that really matter if it doesn't matter already? Put the Web Users Digital CheckBook where the Web User already is...I say..said...and believe for those millions who don't care, balance or pay attention to details about their checking account. And yes Yahoo! does come to mind...I heard a lot of people go there on a daily basis. Shoot at all the distribution channels and let the consumer sort it out. Or like a Gyrene buddy of mine use to say, 'kill them all and let God sort them out' Consumers will rule this e-bill distribution medium, it's success or placement within the digital world....not a hand full of banks. Yahoo! ET AL are the MOST visited sites on the WEB bar none, to ignore this shift in behavior patterns among 10's of millions of consumers for this type of service is a folly. I go back to this...e-mail is everywhere...e-Check Books will be too!