• by Judy Warner , October 18, 2006

Banking customers may one day soon find it possible to check balances, review transactions or be alerted of fraud on their mobile phone.

Yodlee Inc. yesterday said that in response to demand from its financial services clients, it would begin to market a mobile application called Yodlee Mobile in early 2007 that would make such on-the-go functionality possible.

The oddly named software provider in Redwood, Calif. offers a suite of products to allow both online bill payment and so-called account aggregation that allows customer data from multiple sources to be viewed and analyzed. Its clients include Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Ameriprise Financial, AOL, Fidelity Investments, Wachovia, Smith Barney and Charles Schwab.

Yodlee's model, like competitors such as Albridge Solutions, By All Accounts, CashEdge and uMonitor, is to power online banking applications for financial institutions. Its products are customized and branded for the bank or brokerage, so the relationship remains between consumers and their bank or brokerage.

The push behind Yodlee Mobile stems from banks looking at mobile channel opportunities as Internet browsing has increased and security has improved, said Yodlee spokesperson Melanie Flanigan.

Yodlee Mobile "is primarily focused on giving consumers mobile access to their own data," Flanigan wrote in an email exchange yesterday, "including the ability to pay bills and transfer funds. However, we are launching a 'share' functionality that will allow consumers to [give] permission [to] others such as a financial or investment advisor to access and transact with their accounts on their behalf."

Mobile channels provide an increasingly important part of the contact mix with clients, particularly high-net-worth individuals courted by banks and brokerages. According to a recent Wall Street Journal story, customer contact is key to keeping affluent customers satisfied.

Research firm CEG Worldwide found in a study of some 14,000 affluent investors that over a one-year period those investors most satisfied had received 28 contacts either in person, by phone, mail or email. Dissatisfied investors received 17 contacts.

Incidentally, the name Yodlee is neither a juiced-up acronym nor an anagram. Flanigan said the company was founded during the dot-com days "when naming conventions were particularly difficult to secure, but we love it and it has stuck (and stayed)."