Banks’ mobile apps fall short of the grade

I got an
interesting piece of news about a report on mobile apps this week: "Mobile
Apps for Banking 2013" by myprivatebanking, a Zurich-based research
firm.

According
to their analysis, the overall quality of mobile apps for banking is
increasing, but there is still a critical lack of more advanced, user-friendly
features and content.

Apparently,
based upon myprivatebanking’s proprietary ranking mechanism, DBS and Capital
One offer the best mobile apps with Société Générale, Westpac and ABN Amro
making the Top 5.

Most noteworthy
is that, since the last report in 2011, the number of banking apps and app
features have grown explosively, accompanied by an improvement in overall
quality, with the average rating increasing from 35 to 40 out of 60 points in
2013. But myprivatebanking still sees a high divergence between the best
offerings and those from the mass of the banks analyzed.

The winners
of this year’s app ranking is Singapore-based DBS Bank, ranked 4^th
in the 2011 report, alongside US bank, Capital One, who both achieve an overall
score of 50 out of 60 points. 

Top 5
Banks with the best mobile apps strategy (overall 50 banks ranked)

Rank 2013 (Rank 2011)                   Bank      Total
Points (max. 60)

     1   
(New)          -                        Capital One                        50

     1    
(4)              ↑                       DBS
Bank                            50

     3    
(6)              ↑                       Société Générale                 49

     4   
(18)             ↑                       ABN Amro                           48

     4   
(New)          -                        Westpac                             48

After
these, the average bank’s performance is not even close to that of the top
performers with the main shortcomings being that:

• Banking apps offer only basic functionality, missing out on more
  advanced features. Almost one-fifth of the banks still have no ATM and branch
  finders and as well no credit card features integrated in their app
  offerings. Brokerage/trading features are only available for just under
  half of the mobile banks under review. Only 52% of banks offer a contact
  option for “lost and stolen cards”.

• Banks are weak when it comes to providing interesting features and
  product information for customers. Most banks (72 %) do not provide any
  corporate information. Only about half of the banks (56 %) provide
  information about their products and services to app users. Interactive
  calculators to promote these products and services are only found within
  17 mobile banking applications altogether.

• Lack of content and multimedia features. Less than half of the evaluated
  banks offer financial news and banks providing research publications or
  client magazines number only 12 and 16 of the 50 analyzed, respectively.
  Video or audio content is only available for 34 % of the banks in the
  evaluation. The remaining 33 banks do not provide multimedia content at
  all.

• App coverage for tablet devices is still lacking. Currently only 30 out of 50
  banks offer native tablet mobile banking applications.