Many of those that know me will have heard me rant about my dislike of the iPhone. In fairness, my dislike is more to do with the poor network coverage of O2 and I have slowly come to admire the usability of the iPhone. Indeed, I believe that when it is shortly available on ‘real’ mobile networks like Vodafone and Orange/T-Mobile (when their merger is finalised) it will be an immensely powerful tool. Its usability simply is in a class of its own and it makes remote access to basic office applications on the move a workable reality and not a gimmick.
Thousands of applications are now available for the iPhone but until recently I have not seen a business application directly aimed at the financial planning market.
Last week I was pleased to see this is no longer the case when I visited True Potential, a company that provides the system and services infrastructure to support an IFA office. As part of their solution, True Potential offer their IFA’s a client facing website; it isn’t a traditional brochureware site, as many IFAs have, but a real communication tool. The site offers secure access to the client factfind, so that details can be reviewed and updated by the client prior to any meeting or review. It also offers secure messaging to help transport confidential documents and it provides tools to get the latest values for their portfolios so they can analyse and assess portfolio performance.
Excitingly, these functions are now available on the iPhone. To be fair, I don’t imagine many will complete or even update factfinds on the iphone (although sadly some will), but I can certainly see people reviewing their latest portfolio valuations on the move.
As a temporary Google Android user (having abandoned my iPhone for the moment), I am pleased to say True Potential now plan to provide similar functionality on this device and also for Blackberry, Nokia, Windows Mobile and eventually include the Palm Pre. With the expected growth in use of ‘smart-phone’ devices, it is interesting to see True Potential pushing the boundaries of traditional Adviser/Client communication.
