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Monday, January 24, 2011

Calls on the Run


By Michael Scheibach, Executive Editor

Mobile banking is expanding. We can all agree on this statement. But a recent survey by IDC Financial Insights revealed a rather interesting twist.

According to a web poll of 385 individuals about their use of mobile banking, 53 of the respondents indicated they have used a mobile device to interact with their bank. That's 14 percent, which is in line with other surveys.

The twist, however, was that the vast majority used a mobile device to call the bank's toll-free number!

The breakdown was as follows (respondents could choose more than one method):

-- 61.2 percent called the banks toll-free number using their mobile device

-- 40.8 percent used a mobile browser

-- 17.5 percent used a downloadable application

-- 15.5 percent used SMS/text messaging

Another interesting aspect of this small survey was that age was not a factor in calling the toll-free number. Sixty percent of those 18-30 called the number, and 61 percent over 50 called the number.

The major differences came in more technical applications. For example, 21 percent of the 18-30 group used downloadable apps, while only 9.7 percent of those over 50 did the same.

This survey doesn't offer much more than fun facts for conversation. But it just may shed a little more light on the world of mobile banking.