The whispered word among insiders is that online banking usageis flat-lining – it has peaked and it may even be losing users. Thebig winner: mobile.

But few credit unions are prepared to jump on this trend byoffering compelling, user-friendly apps. This train is leaving thestation, who's on board?

Understand this: online banking is the Baltimore Ravens offinancial services. The acclaimed champ, a fact made vivid in anAmerican Bankers Association survey that found online bankingstomping every other customer contact format in terms of userpreference.

The ABA numbers:

* Online banking was the method “most used” by 39% ofcustomers;
* Branches nabbed 18% (down from 25% the year before)
* ATMs won 12% of the vote (down from 15%).

Bringing up the rear – literally in last place in the ABA survey– was mobile with 6%. But note: that number represented a doublingfrom the year prior numbers.

And at least some experts now are claiming that mobile bankingis the channel to watch.

Going forward, “we simply will not see continued dramatic growthin online banking usage,” said futurist Brett King in an interview. “Growth will come in mobile banking whichis growing 300% faster than online banking did. Take-up is veryfast.”

With King's Moven – a new stylebank he is seeking to launch – “we built the mobile app first,before we built online banking.”

The advantage of that mobile first strategy, he said, is that“rather than take an online design and seek to push it onto a smallscreen mobile device – which is what most banks do – we did theopposite.”

As for why King is so bullish on mobile, he explained: “Mobilegives us context-based information that makes it different fromonline.” That is: the mobile device knows where the user is andthat means, when mobile is done right, it can offer highly targetedinformation that just is not presently possible in the onlinechannel.

King added, “The utility of mobile is massively higher and most[credit unions] don't realize this

By 2017 most people will consider their phone their bankingaccount. Now it is a debit card.”

Another reason to think home banking has peaked: It dates backto 1994 when Stanford Federal Credit Union introduced the first Web-based version –- meaningthis technology is pushing 20 years of age. Just about everybodywho wants it, knows about it.

Worse still: “With many financial institutions, what they offerin online banking is a legacy experience that was late updated inthe late 1990s,” said Mike Stern, who heads the finance sector teamat mobile development company Xtreme Labs.

Many online banking websites are clunky, awkwardly designed, andunresponsive to consumer needs.

Stern, by the way, envisions innovations in mobile designbacktracking into redesigned online banking portals which, hethinks, increasingly will look more like what users now get ontheir smartphones.

Meantime, the number of mobile users is growing at a ferociouspace. There are an estimated 500 million today and that number isprojected to hit 1 billion, according to Juniper Research.

Nobody thinks the number will be much lower than that, mainlybecause mobile has the potential to bring digital banks to manyconsumers who have neither a home computer nor broadband access.But they do have mobile phones that, increasingly, are smartphonesand that makes them prime for adopting mobile banking.

One billion will be an easy number to hit – and online banking,meantime, is crawling upwards in number of users, mainly because just abouteverybody who wants to use it already is, and that certainly istrue in the U.S.

Meantime, as the numbers of tablet owners skyrocket – researchfirm IDCestimated that 122 million tablets sold in 2012 and the number willhit 172 million in 2013 – and, said King, tablets are bringing anew, older consumer into the mobile fold. “Tablets have a highlyusable interface,” said King, meaning the big screen and largeon-screen keys may appeal to Baby Boomers who hitherto have scornedthe cramped mobile phone form factor.

Add it up and online banking's day is indeed done. Mobile willrule and this coronation is coming fast.