Account Opening and Loan Origination on Wireless, Paperless Platform Move Users Beyond Balance Inquiries and Account Transfers to Greater Use of the Mobile Delivery Channel.
American consumers are rapidly becoming comfortable with conducting an extensive range of banking functions and transactions through the use of mobile and wireless devices. This according to a 30-month study of application traffic sources recently completed by Andera, a financial software company that simplifies account opening and lending for banks and credit unions.
“Up to now, what we’ve called ‘Mobile Banking’ has largely meant using mobile phones to check account balances and transfer funds between accounts. That’s changing,” said Charles Kroll, president of Andera.
Kroll pointed out that the Federal Reserve Bank’s study, Consumers and Mobile Financial Services, released in March, 2012, stated that the most common use of mobile banking – by 90% of mobile banking users – is to check account balances or recent transactions. Transferring money between accounts is the second most common use (by 42% of users) of mobile banking.
“The Fed’s report is well documented and covers the full spectrum of mobile and online banking behaviors. I believe that Andera’s data show a developing trend on the leading edge of that spectrum. Our applications enable our client institutions’ customers to open new accounts and apply for loans.
“In the two years since we began tracking and analyzing the sources of visits to our company’s platforms, we have seen a 70.3% growth in total number of online visits. But within that total number of online visits, the portion that comes from mobile phones and tablet devices has grown dramatically – by 375%,” explained Kroll.
The Andera study covered five six-month segments, beginning with January 1, 2010 and ending on June 30, 2012. Andera used Google Analytics to track applicant device types for the company’s 15 largest client institutions. During the initial period, just 2.55% of applicants used smart phones. In the period ending June 30, 2012, 9.55% of applicants used smart phones or tablets.
“This tells me two things,” stated Kroll. “First, more and more consumers are getting used to dealing with their financial institutions online. But more importantly, they are feeling confident about establishing new banking relationships or expanding existing ones on a mobile, paperless platform. They are no longer using their smart phones or tablets solely to check balances or move funds.
“And the message to banks and credit unions is unmistakable: your customers will be expecting you to deliver through this channel. Build that capability now, before they look elsewhere,” he concluded.
About Andera
Andera pioneered online account opening in 2004 and now offers a multichannel platform to over 550 bank and credit union customers. Andera’s oFlows platform radically simplifies account opening and lending in branches, online, out in the field, and over the phone. The oFlows platform is a four-time winner of the “Best in Show” award at Finovate.
In July 2012, company president Charlie Kroll accepted an invitation from Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse to address the U .S. Senate Democratic Steering and Outreach Committee on the vital topics of job creation, innovation, and business expansion in the present economic climate.
Andera is privately held, headquartered in Providence, and has offices in San Francisco and New York. For more information, visit www.andera.com.