Consumers and Mobile Financial Services
March 2014
Print- How Mobile Phones Affect Shopping Behavior
- Use of Mobile Phones in Financial Decisionmaking
- Conclusion
- Appendix 1: Technical Appendix on Survey Methodology
Use of Mobile Phones in Financial Decisionmaking
As the use of mobile banking increases, mobile phones are increasingly becoming tools for managing personal finances and tracking spending. For example, 69 percent of mobile banking users report using their mobile phone to check account balances or available credit before making a large purchase in the past 12 months. Of those who checked their balance or available credit, 50 percent report that they decided not to buy an item because of the amount of money in their bank account or the amount of available credit.Some smartphone users actively manage their finances on their mobile phones: 24 percent report using their phone to track purchases and expenses. Among those tracking their finances on their mobile phones, 43 percent use a service provided by their bank, 34 percent use the web browser to access a website, 31 percent use a mobile application for expense tracking, 15 percent take notes in a notepad or word processor, and 7 percent use a spreadsheet.
Because many consumers have near-constant access to their mobile phones, these devices have the potential to provide "just-in-time information" that can influence consumer financial behavior and help them to make different, and perhaps smarter, financial decisions. The actions consumers take in response to the receipt of text message or e-mail notices from their financial institutions demonstrate some of the potential effects of this technology for encouraging consumers to engage in different financial behaviors that may prove to have beneficial outcomes.
More than half (53 percent) of people who use mobile banking receive e-mail alerts from their bank and 43 percent receive text message alerts. Among those receiving alerts, 52 percent receive "low-balance alerts," 49 percent receive "statement available notifications," 42 percent receive "payment due alerts," 41 percent receive "deposit or withdrawal alerts," 38 percent receive "fraud alerts," and 25 percent receive "credit card balance alerts" (figure 8). Consumers who received a low-balance alert from their bank nearly all report taking some action in response: transferring money into the account with the low-balance (47 percent), reducing their spending (37 percent), or depositing additional money into the account (32 percent) (figure 9). Only 19 percent report taking no action in response to receiving a low-balance alert.
Figure 9. Thinking of the most recent low-balance alert you received, which of the following actions did you take after receiving the alert?
