Adaptu Wallet for iPhone

Adaptu Wallet for the iPhone, a temporarily free app, is the closest thing to a mobile wallet I've ever tried. Not only does the app display your latest account balances in real-time and send you bill reminders, like the Editors' Choice-winning iPhone app for Mint.com or the popular Pageonce app, Adaptu Wallet also tracks loyalty programs, forecasts your spending, and lets you photograph and store images of all the loose ends in your wallet, like your insurance, Social Security, and business cards. All of this sits under bank-level security.

But while rich in features, Adaptu Wallet isn't as navigable or user-friendly as Pageonce or Mint.com's iPhone apps. More on that below.

Getting Started
Adaptu offers a couple ways to get started. You can either sign up at Adaptu.com first, fill out your profile, and then launch the app, or you can download the app first and create an account through your mobile device. I prefer signing up at the website since it's easier to fill out all those questions about your financial profile. Once you can start the app, you're asked to set up a 4-digit numeric PIN.

After that, it's time to set up your accounts. Adaptu has established relationships with major U.S. players in the following categories: banking, cell phone carriers (for billing alerts), credit cards, investments, loans, mortgages, and rewards programs. My yuppie lifestyle easily integrated into this app: I found it a snap to link to my Citibank, Verizon, Netflix, Delta Skymiles, Starbucks Rewards, and PayPal accounts. Pageonce offers many more service providers, like Time Warner Cable, Comcast, and conEdison.

The app takes a few minutes to connect to these vendors and automatically imports all your data, from balances to bill deadlines to credit limits. It displays this cleanly on the startup screen. Like with other apps, it automatically categorizes your transactions and lets you manually input cash payments. Now, it's on to making sense out of this information.

Suze Orman in your wallet
Adaptu's marketing folks liken their app to having Suze Orman, the screaming host of Can You Afford It? in your pocket, and I couldn't have put it better. The app takes stock of all your past spending behavior and income to create present and future forecasts of your monthly income and monthly expenditure, with the aim of helping you make smarter purchasing decisions at the point of purchase. On the home screen under My Wallet, tap See Cash Flow to view your monthly cash flow; tilt the app horizontally for a three-month flow. You can set your total monthly budget within the app using a rather clunky slider, although I'd prefer to manage this from the Web application.

The cash flow charts are determined by looking at your previous month's income and spending habits (labeled as need-based or want-based) and predicting this month's income and expenditures. Ultimately, you're supposed to refer to these charts anytime you want to buy a big ticket item, to determine whether you can afford to do it now or if you should wait.

These charts are useful if you take the time to classify your transactions as need-based or want-based and your monthly income is consistent enough to create an accurate forecast. I really liked visualizing my balance and income in coming months. However the OCD side of me recognized that in order to create an accurate cash flow chart, I'd have to go through all my transactions and classify them accurately. Fortunately, Adaptu lets you do this within the app.

In fact my biggest gripe about Adaptu's app is the Web application itself, which you'll use frequently to manage features with the mobile app. It's chock full of valuable information, budgeting software, and financial planning advice, but none of this is clearly organized. For instance when I was first starting out I wanted someone to guide me through the setup process. So I clicked Getting Started, and was brought to what looks like a discussion board with topics like "how to set pay day for budget?" and "Biweekly income budgeting vs. Monthly." Not helpful. The same thing happened when I clicked on sub categories within the toolbar?I was redirected to a discussion board.

Security
The Adaptu Wallet iPhone app is more secure than my physical wallet. Like most finance and banking apps, Adaptu doesn't store data in the device itself to prevent outsiders from recovering the data in case your phone is lost or stolen.

Adaptu says its app uses "bank-level security," which means information is encrypted with AES 256-bit and verified by TRUSTe, VeriSign and MacAfee. The app also forces users to enter a PIN at every login and any time the app goes on standby mode after a minute. It's annoying, but reassuring.

Should You Adapt to Adaptu?
Adaptu Wallet for the iPhone is an ambitious little app that packs many unique features, like spending forecasts, keeping track of loyalty programs, and storing photos of all the minutiae you stuff in your wallet. All this app needs is a card processor and I'm ditching my physical wallet for good. It's not as user-friendly as Mint.com for iPhone, our Editors' Choice in the financial management category, but it's a very promising start for the year-old startup. Get it fast, as Adaptu's marketing folks informed me that they plan to start charging for the app to keep it ad-free.

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