VoiceLog Releases Reg E Xpress Electronic Signature for Automated Debits

VoiceLog  released Reg E Xpress, a phone-based electronic signature process designed for automated demand draft and debit authorization. Reg E Xpress uses a combination of VoiceXML, a speech-based interactive voice system, Web pages, email and standard mail to meet all the requirements of the Federal Reserve and other regulators for both one-time and recurring debit authorizations.

This past December, the Federal Reserve adopted new rules that allow financial institutions to use recorded telephone conversations as electronic signatures to authorize recurring debit transactions to a customer's checking account.  Recurring debits are ongoing transfers from a customer's account that might be used for paying telephone bills or a newspaper subscription. 

Until the December rule change, published comments by the Federal Reserve staff appeared to prohibit the use of telephone recordings to meet the requirements of an "electronic signature" as defined by the Electronic Signatures in Commerce ("Esign") Act.  With the change of the rules, VoiceLog created a process designed to meet the requirements of the Federal Reserve, the Esign Act and NACHA rules to create a process that allows a customer to sign a written agreement using only the telephone. 

Using Reg E Xpress, the company connects their customer to the VoiceLog system, which asks for all the necessary information and records the customer's answers.  At the end of the process, the customer is given a toll-free number they can use to retrieve the agreement and a written copy is sent to them for their records.