It’s no secret that the severe revenue losses from debit card interchange fee reform have left banks in search of fee offsets.

That need intensified just recently, when it became clear that big banks would not be able to impose debit card fees. We have suggested on several occasion over on FierceFinanceIT that one area bank would likely develop involves reward offerings via online bank statements.

The idea is to get super-targeted, highly relevant Groupon-like offers in front of consumers, which could generate fees for banks and vendors and sales for merchants. A cottage industry of vendors has sprung up around the idea, led by the likes of Cardlytics, BillShrink, Access Development, Clovr Media, FMN Technologies and Segmint.

At Bank of America, the concept is moving forward. The bank will roll out a pilot program, dubbed BankAmeriDeals, to its employees in Nevada and the Carolinas as a prelude to a larger employee rollout next month. The key of course is to mine the bank data--perhaps its most valuable resource--to come up with offers that the customer finds compelling. Customers will then be able to click on deal opportunities to receive a credit in their bank account. They might click on a deal for a 15 percent discount on their next purchase a specific store. No registration or promo code is required. Bank of America’s program was developed in conjunction with Cardlytics.

While we fully expect other banks to go the merchant funded route, it must be noted that the revenue opportunity regarding bank statements will be muted initially. It won’t come close to making up the loss of interchange fees. Not to mention that the competition for these sorts of offers is intense.

For more:
- here’s the article from Moneyland

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Big revenue opportunity via online statements