Western Union Goes Wireless - With Trumpet Mobile?

I think it's pretty common knowledge that a lot of immigrants in the U.S. send money home to their families.  Apparently, according to stats from The Washington Post, immigrants sent home about $65.5 Billion in 2007.  Most of that money is sent by wire transfer, like Western Union or MoneyGram.

Western Union has partnered with Radio Shack and Trumpet Mobile to make that process quicker and easier.

Details from The Washington Post

Under the plan, a customer could buy a Trumpet Mobile phone, which costs $29.99 at Radio Shack. The user can load the phone with money through Western Union. To send money to a relative Nicaragua, for example, a customer would specify the amount and the recipient over the phone. The money would then be debited from the customer's account and routed to a local agent in Nicaragua, who would dispense the money to the relative.

 

This is another thing that I think looks better on paper than it actually is.  What I see as the biggest downside is that Trumpet is a prepaid carrier and is only available at RadioShack.  As far as the coverage, I'm thinking it would be ok.  It's pretty clear that they're piggy-backing on Sprint's network (in fact, all of their handsets are discontinued Sprint phones). 

All things considered, it looks like a pretty cool service and could help Western Union take business away from MoneyGram.  If they can expand to other carriers, like the Big 4.  Hopefully Western Union is encouraging people at the Big 4 (AT&T, Verizon Wireless, Sprint and T-Mobile) to keep an eye on the service so that they can offer it to their customers down the road.  When you're providing a service to mobile phone customers, you need to be able to reach more customers than just one carrier can provide.  Especially when that carrier is teeny tiny.

Check out Trumpet Mobile for more information.