RFID-enabled ATM, debit and credit cards may one day allow bank managers to provide more personal service to their customers. As customers enter the bank, RFID interrogators in the doorway would read their cards' RFID tags, identifying them to bank personnel, who would greet them by name, direct VIPs to sales associates without making them wait in line, or instruct tellers to pull up customer records in advance.

Those are some of the scenarios being tested by a handful of banks in Europe and North America that could transform services at the branch level. Consultants say using RFID to save customers time and provide personal assistance could help banks foster customer loyalty and increase their share of a customer's business. That's a growing goal in a market that tends to be fragmented, with customers often having savings in one bank, credit cards with another and their mortgage with yet another bank.

Banks could use the RFID data to analyze customers' behavior and try to sell them additional services. They could tag car-loan, home-equity and mortgage brochures, and follow up with customers who leave the branch with such literature. And there are even RFID applications for customers who don't have RFID bank cards. For example, banks could place RFID labels on brochures for a home-equity line of credit. When a customer picks up the brochure, the advertising in displays could change to follow up on the pitch. "You may not know who that person is," Pacourek says, "but you might as well market to them."

It's also possible for banks to use RFID data to determine accurate bank traffic at certain times of day. "If you know that the average person who comes into a branch spends 25 minutes, including spending 14 minutes waiting in line, you can better design the branch and staffing to meet customer needs," says Peter Regen, vice president of Unisys' global visible commerce division.