CommBank Kaching coming to Facebook

The Commonwealth Bank today announced that it will be bringing its Kaching banking app to Facebook.

Kaching will be accessible through Facebook's apps, and will allow Commonwealth Bank customers to do their banking from within Facebook.

CommBank was unwilling to say a great deal about it, at this time, but it did reveal that customers will be able to view balances and transactions, pay bills via BPAY, make third-party transactions protected by NetCode SMS and make real-time peer-to-peer payments to their Facebook friends.

And, when that's done, customers can post that information to their wall or a friend's wall.

Andy Lark, chief marketing and online officer, clarified that it would be mainly for social use — such as paying dues to a social group. "I could pay my plumber, but I wouldn't post that to my wall, because it's boring," he said.

The bank was also careful to explain that it was taking security very seriously, and that any unauthorised transactions would be 100 per cent covered by a security guarantee.

"The power of Facebook for payments is only now becoming clear. It will change banking for consumers and for small business — providing hundreds of thousands of merchants in Australia with full payment systems access. No matter how sophisticated a business' online presence is, they will now have access to a state of the art payments capability, making a level playing field for all," said David Lindberg, executive general manager cards payments and retail strategy.

CommBank couldn't give a concrete time frame, only saying that Kaching for Facebook would be rolled out sometime before the end of 2012.