Cingular to Offer Banking by Cell Phone

Cingular has signed deals with several banks that will eventually allow it to offer services that let its customers manage their accounts and pay bills via their cell phones, it said Tuesday.

The service will be available to customers that download a special application, and belong to banks managed by Wachovia, BancorpSouth, Regions Financial, and SunTrust among others. There will be no additional fee to use the service.

Wachovia operates banks in 21 states, while Regions Financial operates banks under the Regions and AmSouth names in 16 states across the Midwest and South. SunTrust operates throughout 10 states, and BanCorpSouth in six states across the southern US.

A multi-million dollar marketing campaign is planned to promote the service, which Cingular -- soon to be AT&T -- hopes will spur use of its premium Internet service. The application will be included on handsets beginning later in the year.

AT&T cites market research that showed many customers found the service to be quite useful, and more than three-quarters said that it could help them in making better decisions on spending money.