What's Time Banking All About?

An increasingly popular movement in banking offers accounts with no minimum deposit, no interest fees, and a generous rewards program. Interested? Then it is time to check out time banking.

Time banks offer members the chance to earn Time Dollars which can be spent on services such as a yoga class or home repairs, all without any cash being exchanged. How? Using the pay-it-forward concept, time bank members perform community service for other time bank members and in return receive Time Dollars which they can use to get community service-type help in the future.

“Time banking is exciting because it allows members to contribute the things that they like to and can do,” says Mashi Blech who runs the Visiting Nurse Service of NY (VNSNY) Community Connections TimeBank in Manhattan. So far, time banks have more than 100,000 members world-wide. When a new member joins a time bank, they submit a list of what services they can do for others, where they live, and when and how often they are available.

Edgar Cahn, the founder and CEO of TimeBanks USA, created Time Dollars in the late 1980s. He got the idea while recovering from a heart attack. “I didn’t like feeling useless,” says Cahn. “I knew other patients must feel the same way. I thought there must be some way that we can help each other out.” Cahn later developed his idea at the London School of Economics. “I thought, couldn’t we create a new kind of money,” he says. “It was before frequent flier miles and rewards programs, so people really thought that I had lost it.” But, the tax-exempt currency that Cahn dreamed of eventually came to fruition and is known today as Time Dollars.

A Time Dollar is basically equivalent to one hour’s worth of service work, according to Blech. If a member is looking for a service, they can call the time bank and submit a request. A database is then used to create a match. Whether it is cooking dinner for someone’s family or escorting someone home from the hospital, members who volunteer their time gain one Time Dollar for each hour that they spend helping others. The Time Dollars are then recorded on a deposit slip and entered into the database.

Time Dollars can be used to purchase any number of services or products offered by members of a time bank. Loretta Bega, a member of Community Exchange TimeBank in Allentown, Pa., recently took a trip to the symphony with her time dollars. Bega was able to do so because the local symphony is a member of her time bank. They make tickets available to members of the time bank and in return, the members help stuff envelopes or work as ushers. Another time bank in Portland, Maine offers movie rentals to their members. Members can get a three day rental of a new movie release for a half Time Dollar or a five day rental of three older movies for one Time Dollar. (They can even the flicks delivered for another Time Dollar.)

Service exchanges may help a family's bottom line, but Blech says her time banks have a higher purpose, too. “It’s not so much about the Time Dollars as it is about the relationship and community building.” That community bonding expands beyond individuals. Blech’s TimeBank has more than 80 business partners, many of whom offer discounts to the bank's members. Says Blech: “The business owners and saw the TimeBank model as positive and healthy because it isn’t charity and doesn’t create a dependency.”