Some banks are better than others. My own bank, BBVA Compass is not exactly terrific, but I don’t have an abundance of choices in my small city. One thing I’ve long lamented is the lack of a Windows Phone app to make checking my account easier. Heck, BBVA Compass doesn’t even offer a mobile version of their site, so logging in and checking my stuff on my phone has always taken longer than necessary. Those difficulties finally came to an end this week, as there is now an official BBVA Compass app on the Windows Phone Store.
Start me up
When first booting the app, it asks you to accept the terms of use (that nobody ever reads) before proceeding. As a nice touch, you can email said terms to yourself just in case you actually do want to read them at a later time. From there, you’ll need to go through BBVA Compass’s three-step login process every time you launch the app. Their website works the same way, but at least the interface is far more streamlined here.
Features
The app has four main pages that you can switch between with horizontal wipes:
- Dashboard: Get a quick overview of your account(s) by viewing available balance and posted balance. It even breaks the information down into a pie chart, something you won’t find on the real website.
- Accounts: From here you can select an account and see all of your pending and posted transactions. Any transaction that removes money from an account (such as purchases) appears in red with a minus sign in front of it. At first that fooled me into thinking I’d somehow gone over my limit, but thankfully that wasn’t the case. Deposits are listed in blue. You can also swipe to the right and view ‘checks only,’ which should be handy for people who still write checks. Finally, tapping the Filters button at the bottom allows users to filter by time period and toggle deposits or withdrawals on and off.
- Transfers: People with more than one account can move money between them here.
- More: Dial the customer service phone number, view a variety of help topics and the terms of use, or find nearby bank locations. The ‘Find Us’ feature uses your phone’s location service to discover any banks or ATMs in the area and display them on a map. The feature accurately located the nearest bank and even one about fifteen minutes away. By tapping on a location, you’ll see its address and phone number. You can even have GPS map directions calculated on the fly.
Overall Impression
BBVA Compass is a long-needed app that doesn’t disappoint. Its good, clean Windows Phone App-style UI matches the bank website’s blue and white color scheme perfectly. The app does everything you could want it to do, and so much more efficiently than going through the website on a phone. If you have the misfortune of banking with BBVA Compass (can you tell I love them?), don’t hesitate to grab the app today.
BBVA Compass is a 2 MB free download for Windows Phone 7 or 8. Get it here on the Windows Phone Store.
Thanks to Daniel Marshall for the tip!
