1980 - for the first time in the history of Western Union revenues from money transfers exceeded the income from the telegraph service. Another invention of Western Union - time synchronization. Separation of the companies had two objectives: first, to give Western Union the opportunity to develop more intensively, and secondly, to help First Data to return to its original activity (in 1992 the company separated from the payment system of American Express as an independent financial services company). One of the common kinds of money transfer is a transfer via the international system of Western Union. You do not need to open a bank account, so you can send or receive money in any of the 170 000 service points of Western Union around the world. In 1914 Western Union engineers invented the first payment card - a prototype of the modern credit card. Before transition to remittances Western Union company rendered services on sphere of cable communication. In 1879 Western Union left the telephone business after losing a lawsuit against Alexander Graham Bell - the patent holder on the phone.