By ANDREW MOORE
Reporter with Silicon Hills News
What is the fastest way to share money with friends and family? Always carry cash? Use pre-paid cards? With an Akimbo Card account, users can share money with any other Akimbo card holder instantly by using either a mobile app or the Akimbo Website via the internet. Akimbo accounts have both primary users and sub users, making it possible for parents to give “allowance cards” to their kids or employers to transfer funds quickly to secondary employee cards.
Created by CEO Houston Frost, the Akimbo card is a full-fledged Visa debit card used in partnership with Bancorp Banks. Users do not, however, need to access bank services to use the cards and transfer money between cards. In fact, Akimbo can essentially replace a normal bank account for day to day needs.
The Akimbo business model relies on interchange revenue – the small fees paid by banks for card transactions – as well as other fees such as ATM charges. Signing up for an account is free and there are currently no monthly fees, though there may be fees for creating additional sub accounts. Akimbo moved from Austin to San Antonio in February, and is currently located Geekdom of San Antonio. The startup has six full time employees, and around a dozen part time employees – many of which were acquired after moving to Geekdom.
For its next step, Akimbo is in the process of adding an “instant check loading” feature to their cards that will allow users to load the check on their cards within 30 minutes. The feature is now in beta.
