The German bank won't say when it will start offering the service, but observers say it could be some time away. Klaus Thoma, a spokesman for Deutsche Bank, said the project is part of the bank's strategy to provide customers with a variety of electronic-banking alternatives. It already offers Internet-based services, including stock trading.

`Just the beginning' Deutsche Bank isn't the first to realise the potential of mobile phones in banking. Finnish-SwedishMeritaNordbanken will later this year become the first bank to put Nokia's first generation of WAP mobile phones to the test, says Veli-Matti Pelho, a senior manager at Nokia Wireless Software Solutions. "This is just the beginning of this area. It will evolve over time," Pelho says. Nokia is one of four founding members of the WAP Forum, a group founded 18 months ago to create an industry standard for wireless technology. The other three founding members are Telefon AB L.M. Ericsson of Sweden and Motorola Inc. and Phone.Com Inc., both of the U.S. For European banks, offering interactive services over mobile phones is just one of many ways they are hoping to make life easier for customers.

Many banks are already offering Internet, personal-computer and telephone-based services, while others are branching out into new areas such as television banking. Credit Agricole in France and Spanish banks Bancaria de Espana SA and Banco Bilbao Vizcaya are already offering interactive banking services over digitaltelevision, while HSBC Holdings PLC is hoping to launch a similar product in the U.K. within the next two months. But it is the potential offered by wireless technology that has many people excited.

"People are already accustomed to using telephone banking," says Suzan Nolan at Paris-based consultancy BlueSky International. "It's truly anytime, anywhere, anyhow." Poised to launch services Among the banks that have already started offering interactive services over mobile phones, or are about to get on board, are Bank of Montreal, which teamed up late last year with Toronto-based software provider 724 Solutions Inc. Citigroup Inc.'s electronic-banking unit e-Citi also joined forces recently with 724 Solutions and Sonera SmartTrust, a Finland-based mobile-communications group, and is expected to get its service off the ground shortly.

In France, five banks including Banque Nationale de Paris SA and Credit Mutuelle have started offering some services through an alliance with Cegetel SA, using mobile phonessupplied by Alcatel SA. Other banks looking at the idea include BankAmerica Corp., Dresdner Bank AG of Germany and Barclays PLC in the UK.

Some warn, however, that the concept could take some time to achieve mass appeal. In a report last week, research group International Data Corp. says that while industry momentum behind the technology is "massive," it is unlikely that WAP-enabled services will take off in Europe until at least 2001.

The Wall Street Journal