ONTARIO, Calif. — CO-OP Financial Services will take a further step toward broadening its identity away from its well-known CO-OP Network when it begins to offer credit card processing, a CO-OP executive said.

Jim Hanisch, senior vice president with the CUSO, which is the parent of CO-OP Network, expanded on the remarks that CO-OP CEO Stan Hollen had offered at the CUSO's annual meeting. Hanisch said the CUSO intends to offer the service by the end of the year, but said that key details, such as whether their CUSO would have its own card platform or process on someone else's, had yet to be set.

"We decided to take this step because we had so many member CUs asking us to start offering it," Hanisch explained, adding that the organization's history of efficiency and transaction volume suggested that it would be able to offer card transaction processing at a very reasonable price."