BankSimple, which his nearing a soft launch of its Web banking services, has signed two bank partners.
Simple Finance Technology Corp., the Brooklyn company behind BankSimple, will work with The Bancorp Inc., of Wilmington, Del., and CBW Bank of Weir, Kansas, to sponsor the issuing of debit cards and to hold funds.
BankSimple has said it wants to provide a straightforward, streamlined banking relationship with few fees. However, since Simple Finance is not a bank, it must work with partners to provide its services.
"Demand for the BankSimple product was much higher than we expected," Josh Reich, Simple Finance's chief executive, said in an interview Friday. "We are working with both [banks] for technology and scale advantages."
BankSimple has tested its services internally with employees and plans to test externally with 100 family and friends this summer.
More than 50,000 customers have signed up for the beta test of the bank, and BankSimple plans to roll out services to the first 12,000 people before the end of the year.
In March, BankSimple announced a partnership with TX Via Inc. for processing debit card, online bill payment and automated clearing house transactions.
