While bankers jump at shadows over speculation of a banking play by Australia Post, perhaps they need to wonder if its former sibling Telstra has fresh ideas on how to succeed in financial services.Telstra yesterday said it hired Paul Fegan, who served briefly as chief executive of St George Bank, as managing director of strategy and corporate services. Fegan served as CEO for a year or so prior to the takeover by Westpac. His background is in retail banking operations. Prior to joining St George in 2002 he was chief operating officer at  Yorkshire Bank in Britain, a subsidiary of National Australia Bank.Fegan will "lead a new business unit that combines Telstra's public policy, communications, corporate strategy, and mergers and acquisitions functions" the company said in a statement.Telstra also announced the hiring of an IBM Europe executive, Brendon Riley, as chief operating officer.Telstra has dabbled in financial services over the years with scant success.Ten years ago it folded its Eftpos carriage business into Keycorp, destroying hundreds of millions in shareholder value over the subsequent decade.Telstra around the same time invested in Sunrise Exchange, a provider of processing services to intermediaries in the insurance industry. Telstra sold that business in 2008 to Ebix for unknown terms.Telstra has also had made a series of efforts - none of them fruitful - to develop consumer payments products.One perennial task for Telstra management is the need to lower merchant fees on credit card payments. One long-touted option is for Telstra to follow the lead of Coles and Woolworths and become an "acquirer" of its own payments, though there's not much sign of recent interest from the company in doing so.