Comarch Makes a Personal Finance Management Application for Bank BPH

Bank BPH (Poland) launched a new internet banking feature for retail customers – the Financial Assistant. The Assistant will present customers with clear colorful charts showing their current assets, expenses and budgeting options. The application designed for Bank BPH by Comarch is an example of PFM (Personal Finance Management). PFM solutions are forecasted to change internet banking around the world in the coming years.

Gartner analysts expect that in the next two years banks will have to provide account aggregation giving consumers a consolidated 360-degree view of their total financial relationship. In a report by Gartner, Comarch was mentioned as one of four companies offering a personal finance management module for online banking and mobile devices.

The Financial Assistant at Bank BPH is equipped with an advanced automatic transaction categorization mechanism, which instantly produces expense graphs showing what kind of spendings dominate the customer’s budget. The auto-learning mechanism is responsible for properly categorizing individual transactions, so that the takeout coffee bought each day at a nearby gas station does not get labeled as “fuel”. The Financial Assistant also makes it easy to search transactions regardless of the account from which they occurred and whether they were transfers or card payments.  

In the reports, apart from the expense structure, the customers will see a comparison of income and expenses in chosen time intervals. The personalized limits will help them to control the budget: if the customer decides to limit dining out in favor of home cooking, the dining limit for restaurants and coffee bars will alert them in case of approaching the set spending limit.

Bank customers appreciate PFM solutions for the wealth of information they provide requiring almost no effort on the customer’s side. The data is processed automatically and using the PFM is very intuitive,- says  Anna Płowiec-Wandas, Business Solutions Manager at Comarch SA, - On the other hand, the PFM is a very effective sales channel for the banks, helping them to learn about their customers’ needs and offer products matching their customers’ current plans and financial situations.