BillPayer Conversion is Complete and System is Available
Recurring payments to payees will not be visible until Midnight on Tuesday. Do not add a new recurring payment to your payee if a payment was set up previously. Adding a new recurring payment may result in duplicate payments to your payee. Recurring payments will appear normally on September 1st.
Online Banking and BillPayer Unavailable on August 31st
Making Payments Easier in BillPayer
On September 1st, Financial Center will be making significant upgrades and improvements to its BillPayer service in online banking. Members will find a new appearance and interface for BillPayer that will make paying your bills online easier than ever.
One important change is how payments will be processed after September 1st in BillPayer. Previously you may have scheduled your payment a certain period of time before it was due to allow sufficient time for it to be delivered on or before its due date.
Now, the pay date that you designate for your bills will be the date that you want the payee to receive your payment. When scheduling your payment, BillPayer will give you the next available date you can send a payment to your payee. You will also have the ability to schedule future or recurring payments.
If you have questions, please contact Member Services at 317.916.7700 or 800.473.2328.
Upgrades Coming to BillPayer on September 1st
Here are some of the improvements you’ll see starting September 1st.
See it all at a glance.
The new Payment Center lets you make payments, view pending payments, recent payments, and bill reminders all on one screen.
Search for vendors.
Add a new vendor by typing the company name, mailing address, or phone number. Simply enter your account number and add your bills to be paid.
Schedule payments by the due date.
Enter the date you would like the vendor to receive your payment, and we will take care of the rest.
Keep your money longer.
Your money will remain in your account until the day you select the payment to be made to your vendor.
Set up reminders.
Never make a late payment again! When you set up email reminders, you’ll receive a message telling you when your payment is due.
Make recurring payments.
No more hassle of paying the same bill for the same amount each month. Set up a recurring payment once and have your bill paid each month automatically.
Receive your bills electronically.
Participating vendors allow you to receive your bill electronically through BillPayer rather than through the mail.
View an online demo of the new BillPayer system.
If you have questions, please contact Member Services at 317.916.7700 or 800.473.2328.
What Our Members Say - Love Earning Interest on Checking
Randall Reed
Avon, IN
How does Online Bill Payment work?
In a recent survey released by Fiserv, one of the largest Bill Payment processors in the nation, one of the largest deterrents to online bill payment usage is “understanding how it works”. So, I’ll answer that concern for Finance Center FCU members.
Setting-up BillPayer involves just a few simple steps:
- Entering a payee list
- Scheduling payments
- Maintaining payment schedules or amounts
First, a member adds payees to their Bill Payer list, by entering the details from the bill they receive (Payee Name, Address used to pay the bill, Payee Phone number, and Payee Account Number). These details are used to match the member’s bill with the most efficient means of payment for that payee. Payment means include: Same-Day payment, electronic payment, and Paper check payment.
Payment Scheduling can take multiple forms depending on how the member configures the payment schedules. Each form meets a variety of member needs.
- One-time payments
- Recurring payments
- Biller directed payments (coming to Financial Center in September)
One Time Payments - In this form, members set the amount and date of the payment each time it needs to be made. This is necessary for bills where the amount varies with each bill, or when the member wants to control the date the bill is paid. This method provides the member with the most control, but also requires the member to interact with BillPayer the most.
Recurring Payments – This method is great for bills where the amount and due date only change once or twice a year. Utility bills with “budget” payments, insurance premiums, or other fixed payment bills fit well in this method. The member sets the amount of the bill and the due date. The system then pays the bill this amount by the due date with the frequency the member assigns (Monthly, Quarterly, Annually, etc.). This method requires occasional member interaction such as when the billing amount changes.
Bill Directed (coming to Financial Center in September) - This can be either One-time or Recurring. This is the next advancement in Bill Payment services. This service enhancement allows billers (payees) to present their bill through the Bill Payment service (e-Bills). The due date, amount due, and payment method are all part of the presentation of the bill. The member can review the bill and then direct the Bill Payment service to pay the bill. In some cases this Method will allow the BillPayer service to use the Biller presented information to manage the entire payment process. So, if the amount varies on the bill the amount paid would automatically vary without the member interacting with BillPayer at all. This method is great for reducing the amount of US Mail and for bills with variable amounts such as telephone or cell phone bills.
Phishing Alert
Tab-Nabbing - Another Internet Phishing Scam
Found this article and thought I should share.
Just when you thought you'd seen it all, a new and particularly nasty form of Internet phishing, called tab-nabbing, poses a new identity theft threat to web users.
Phishing happens when a scammer deceives you into giving away information about yourself, mostly account details such as username and password.
Usually via an email or a link on another web page, they direct you to a bogus site that looks exactly like the genuine article -- like PayPal or Amazon for example -- and captures your login details when you try to sign in.
The crook can then use those details to sign on and remove money or make purchases on your account.
All of these previous online phishing scams rely on the user being fooled into clicking a link, whereas the tab-nabber plays a different and much less obvious trick.
If you're a regular Internet user, you'll know how tabs work. In your browser -- for example, Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari or Google Chrome -- they allow you to have several pages open at once, and to hop from one to the other.
Sometimes, when you click on a link in one page, it opens the new page in a separate tab, and it's not unusual to have half a dozen or more tabs open at once.
You even forget which ones you had open, which helps the tab-nabber immensely.
The way this particularly evil form of Internet phishing works goes like this:
- You already have a couple of tabs open when you land on a page controlled by the tab-nabber (though you won't know this).
- While you're viewing this page, the tab-nabber accesses your browsing history to see which sites you regularly visit that have value to him -- again like Amazon, PayPal or an email account like Gmail.
- Tab-nabber then changes one of your tabbed pages to mimic one of these sites, complete with what looks like the genuine logo on the tab itself, hoping, when you return to this tab, you will think you must have visited that page earlier and just forgotten.
- Even better, from the tab-nabber's point of view, you may really have just visited the genuine site (your bank, for example), left it open in the tab, and then returned to it to discover you seem to have been logged out.
- Either way, the aim is to get you to think you're logging in again and, hey presto, the scammer has pulled off his cunning Internet phishing trick.
Two key aspects make this much more effective than previous online phishing scams:
First, you don't have to click a link to get to the bogus page; you just click on what looks like a genuine page tab.
Second, it uses sites you habitually visit whereas phishing emails often seem to come from organizations you've had no dealings with, so you would immediately suspect something was wrong.
Making this scheme more effective, if you do your banking online, the bank often will actually sign you out if there's no activity on their page, even if you still have it open in a tab. It's not unusual to be asked to sign on again.
However, two other things give the tab-nabbing trick away: First, although the page may look genuine, the Internet address or URL (the name of the site given in the address bar at the top of your browser) won't.
So, the real Amazon home page for instance will show "amazon.com" but a bogus page will have something quite different, even if it has the word "amazon" in it.
Third, the little padlock icon that appears in your browser (usually bottom right or beside the address bar), when you visit a secure website, will generally be missing.
Still, it's a wicked deception, highlighted recently by a specialist who works for Mozilla, the organization that makes the Firefox browser. You can see his video demonstration of tab-nabbing (sometimes also called "tabnabbing" or "tabnapping") here if you have Adobe Flash installed.
What can you do to ensure you don't fall victim to this new type of Internet phishing? To be doubly-secure, here's what you should do.
- Get into the habit of glancing at the address bar for every page you visit or revisit. This makes good secure-surfing sense anyway.
- Look for that padlock on what should be a secure site page.
- After visiting a secure page, close it when you're done, rather than keeping it open in a tab.
- If a site invites you to sign on again, close the tab and re-key the correct address.
Any one of these four steps should help steer you clear of a tab-nabbing scam -- and if you have security software integrated with your browser, that should flag bogus sites too. With Internet phishing, you just can't be too cautious.
Source (http://www.scambusters.org/internetphishing.html or http://www.scambusters.org/ search for Internet Scambusters #395)
Credit Unions Featured on Fox Business
$7.5 billion in savings for credit union members.
1.2 million new credit union members.
$696 billion in business loans from credit unions.
What's keeping you from joining an Indianapolis credit union?
What is a Credit Union?
"A credit union is a friendly, 'not-for-profit,' financial institution that is comprised of members only. Credit unions offer special deals to its members, unlike 'for profit,' big-name banks. Any profit made by the credit union is directed back to members via higher interest rates on savings/checking accounts and lower interest rates on credit cards and loans, unlike a commercial bank, which constantly thinks of new ways to increase its revenue for shareholders via methods such as customer fees."
I couldn't have said it better myself.
Fraud Alert
Financial Center COO Susan Ward Named NAFCU Professional of the Year
The National Association of Federal Credit Unions (NAFCU) named Susan Ward, Senior Vice President/Chief Operating Officer of Financial Center the 2010 Professional of the Year recipient. NAFCU’s Annual Awards Competition honors and rewards the credit union community’s best performers. NAFCU selected the winner from federal credit union employees who demonstrated professionalism, commitment to the members and credit union community, staff morale, achievements and innovations, and commitment to continued education.ATM Service Outages on Saturday, July 17th
Financial Center Locations Closed on July 5th
Are you using Overdraft Services from Financial Center?
What does Overdraft Services cover?
Overdraft Services covers your everyday debit card transactions and ATM withdrawals even if you have insufficient funds in your account. Overdraft Services allows you to complete your transaction and purchase items that you need such as groceries or gas when you may have insufficient funds in your account. Overdraft Services is available when you need it the most when emergency situations arise and you do not have sufficient money in your account.
How much does Overdraft Services cost?
If you overdraw your account through an everyday debit card transaction or ATM withdrawal, Financial Center will charge you a $33 fee to authorize the transaction. This fee will be assessed each time you use your debit card or make a withdrawal from an ATM until you have sufficient funds in your account to cover the transaction. We only charge a fee when you utilize Overdraft Services. It is free to opt-in for this service, and the service is free even if you never use it.
Please tell us if you want to keep this convenient coverage on your account for everyday debit card transactions and ATM withdrawals. If you do not opt-in to Overdraft Services and there are insufficient funds to cover a transaction when you need it, Financial Center will not authorize the transaction after August 15, 2010.
If you choose to opt-in to Overdraft Services, these transactions will continue to be covered.
Click here to either opt-in or opt-out of Overdraft Services from Financial Center. Your response is needed by July 1, 2010.
If you have further questions, contact your Indianapolis credit union at 317.916.7700 or 800.473.2328 or visit any Center location.
Financial Center Pairs with Samaritan's Feet
Indianapolis credit union Financial Center has partnered with Samaritan's Feet; an international humanitarian organization focused on providing new athletic shoes to children in need. All Center locations will be collecting new children's athletic shoes and donations through July 17th.Financial Center will donate a new pair of shoes for each checking account opened until July 17th. Shoes and monetary donations can be made in any Center location; in addition, monetary donations can be made through Secure Message within Financial Center Online.
To donate through Secure Message, type SHOES in the subject line of your message. In your message, indicate how much money you would like to donate and whether you would like it deducted from your savings or checking account.
You can also help by texting SHOES to 85944 to make a $5 donation to Samaritan's Feet.
All shoes and monetary donations will be used to support children in Central Indiana.
Help your local credit union help children in need. Donate today!
Make the Switch to a Local Credit Union

To our surprise, Landon has done well. After explaining to him that bottles were for babies, he understood that using a cup was part of becoming a "big boy". It was hard, but it was time to make the change.
It's kind of like switching from an Indianapolis bank to an Indianapolis credit union.
Sure, there are challenges to switching financial institutions and many things that have to get done. Financial Center, our Indianapolis credit union, can help make the switch to our institution easy and pain free.
With our online switch kit, we can help you close your account with your current Indianapolis bank, change your direct deposit and any automatic withdrawals you may have set up. Our staff is also available to help you switch. Give us a call at 317.916.7700 or visit any of our Indianapolis credit union locations.
Don't Change Interchange
Please join your local credit union in voicing opposition to this legislation.
Is a Local Credit Union Better than a Bank?
An Indianapolis credit union such as Financial Center also offers better rates on deposits like our Reward Checking product which pays 3.01% APY if you meet the account requirements each month.
Are Credit Unions a better bet than banks? You decide.

