FinTech News
Embedded Earned Wage Access Platform Reset Raises $6 Million
A FinTech that allows credit unions and smaller banks to offer earned wage access to customers has raised a new investment round.
About Reset and Its Latest Round:
This week, Reset revealed that it had raised $6 million in funding. The seed round included participation from Georgia’s Own Credit Union, InTouch Credit Union, Chartway Credit Union, VyStar Credit Union, and One Washington Financial as well as Curql, Navari, and the Bankers Helping Bankers Fund. To date, Reset has now raised a total of $8 million. With the funds, the company intends to expand sales, increase product development, and move up launches for current deployments.
With Reset, credit unions and community banks can offer fee-free earned wage access to members. This is made possible via cards issued by the institutions themselves. As the company notes, such features help grow direct deposit participation as customers with higher direct deposit amounts can unlock greater earned wage advances. Specifically, Reset says that average customers increase deposits by 27% and have checking balances that are 36% higher than previous levels.
Additionally, since these funds are issued via a card, credit unions and banks can also increase their interchange revenue. Indeed, Reset found that institutions saw interchange revenue increase by 20%. Lastly, Reset says that their service is easy for institutions to launch because it embeds into existing tech stacks.
What They’re Saying:
Discussing the round and the company’s new investors, Reset CEO and co-founder Matt Dicou said, “When your customers lead your funding round, there is no clearer market signal. These credit unions aren’t just writing a check. They’re making a decision about where they want to take their members, their institutions, and the credit union industry.”
Dicou went on to note how the service helps small institutions compete with FinTechs, saying, “[Credit unions] see that Chime and other neobanks are successfully recruiting people away from credit unions today. Our credit union partners already have trusted member relationships. We give them what they need to remain the primary financial home.”
To that point, InTouch Credit Union President Kent Lugrand added, “We’re not just going to sit back and watch our members leave for neobanks. Chime earned hundreds of millions in new revenue and acquired billions in new deposits in their first year offering earned wage access — and many of those deposits came from credit unions like ours. Partnering with Reset gives us the ability to fight back and stay relevant for the members who depend on us the most.”
My Thoughts:
Despite having a name that surely has to be used by dozens of other companies, Reset seems to be doing something special here. It’s clear from this funding round and the praise the firm is getting from its customers-turned-investors that there’s a real interest in this product.
Personally, I’m also happy to see legacy institutions adopting FinTech features. To me, it’s the best of both worlds, delivering the accessibility customers want with the security that NCUA or FDIC insurance provides.
With that, I expect to hear more from Resert (and I wouldn’t mind reading about a name change in the future, too).