TNB Balance Transfer Promotion Nets $2.2 million

The TNB Card Services 2006 Fall Balance Transfer promotion brought in more than $2.2 million in card balances for participating credit unions. The annual pre-holiday promotion ran from September through November 2006.

One of the participating credit unions was the $580 million Forth Worth, Texas-based EECU. It captured more than $222,000 in outstanding balances with an average transfer rate of $3,200. According to Keith Spivey, vice-president payment systems of EECU, “We initiated this promotion with a goal of growing our card balances by $200,000, which we exceeded. We also surpassed the goal of our target response rate and the average balance transfer amount. In all, this promotion was highly successful.”

Another participating credit union, DATCU of Denton, Texas, with assets of $368 million, also had strong results from the promotion. With a response rate of 2.32% and average balance transfer of $3,180, DATCU generated more than $216,000 in new balances.

R. Dean Barnes Jr., senior vice president-lending at DATCU, said the 60-day, zero percent interest rate deserved a lot of credit for the positive response. “We experienced an increase in the response rate and balance transfer over the 2005 Fall Balance Transfer promotion,” Barnes noted, “which illustrates this type of promotion is something our cardholders continue to positively respond to.”

Smaller credit unions also benefited from the promotion. El Paso Corporation Federal Credit Union, with assets of $89 million, offered a life-of-balance rate for its cardholders, bringing in $86,500, with an average check of $3,400. The credit union offered a 5.9% rate for the life of the balance and generated a response rate of 3.21%, a significant increase over the response rate from previous balance transfer promotions, noted Debbie Washington, loan officer of El Paso Corporation FCU.

The TNB promotion enabled the 22 credit unions that participated to customize it for their cardholders by selecting the interest rate and opting for a life-of-balance annual percentage rate, which was available for every percentage rate offered.