You see them everywhere: in bustling big cities, in suburbs with manicured lawns and in the rustic small towns of rural America. They are neighborhood financial service centers and some 11,000 ??" that's almost triple the number of Wal-Mart stores in the U.S. ??" dot the landscape from coast to coast, cashing more than 180 million checks a year valued at around $55 billion.

Serving the nation's 75 million "underserved" or "unbanked" consumers, these centers have proliferated as many of these people chose to bypass banks in favor of faster cash transactions.

Financial centers offer a broad range of other services including money orders, electronic bill payments, money wire transfers, cash advance loans, automatic teller machine access, government benefit and payroll payments, deferred deposit services, electronic tax preparation, prepaid debit cards, deposit acceptance services, public transportation fare and token sales, motor vehicle license plate and title distribution and postage stamp sales.

Bearing witness to the burgeoning growth of this industry is the Financial Service Centers of America, or FiSCA for short, a professional trade organization representing these financial services providers across the country.

Founded in 1987 as the National Check Cashers Association the group changed its name in 1999 to reflect the evolution of the business.

According to the group's Web site (http://www.fisca.org/), the financial service center industry started with a simple idea: "Provide an easy way for hard working people to convert paychecks into cash within a short walk from their homes or jobs."

FiSCA members are continually expanding the roster of services offered to meet customer needs. Just as the services offered by the industry have expanded over time, the markets we they serve have broadened.

Traditionally FiSCA members were concentrated in lower income neighborhoods, serving and hiring residents of these communities. More recently as middle income consumers have demanded more convenient financial services, financial service centers have expanded into their communities. Indeed, the greatest growth of the industry can be seen in the suburban market.

FiSCA reports that while financial service center businesses touch the lives of millions of Americans, misconceptions still exist about the industry, its services and the consumers it serves.

A sign that progress is being made at overcoming these myths is in the growing number of partnerships between FiSCA members and banks and credit unions, the group says.

These partnerships create a cost effective way for traditional deposit services to be made available in underserved communities. FiSCA says it supports these ventures and is working to educate state and federal regulators about opportunities that these ventures open to consumers.