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who made this?
Kristen went to the doctor once because her family thought she had a suspicious growth on her right ear. Turns out, it was her cell phone!
Quicken Beam
Free
Last site visit: November 21, 2008
Why Quicken Beam?
You’re at your favorite store. The thing you’ve been eyeing for a while is on sale! You want to buy it now.
But wait… your balance has been running low and the last thing you need is another overdraft fee.
There's no ATM or computer to check your account. Time to Beam. Text BAL to 636363 and you instantly receive your balance and last five transactions.
Now you know you're in the clear and can spend with confidence.
Thanks, Quicken Beam!
Requirements
It's FREE! No subscription, no hidden fees, we're serious.
You only need a mobile phone and an account at a financial institution. Quicken Beam supports most banks, but not all.
Have an iPhone? Then Quicken Beam is a must have. Just go to Quickenbeam.com.
We love feedback!
Have an idea for Quicken Beam? Questions about using it? We want to hear from you! Please leave a comment below or send us an email.
Kevin, solid feedback. You’re right, just the balance by itself doesn’t mean as much to some people. The last five transactions that come with each update should help provide context on cleared deposits or expenses, which will help inform decisions.
Overall, http://www.QuickenOnline.com may be for you. (Click on the link in Beam, same user ID)
It has some cool budgeting features, and in a couple weeks will have alerts that help monitor spending by category. Don’t get me wrong...Beam is perfect for Lots of people, but Quicken Online fits others. Thanks again for the comments. Let us know if you have other thoughts. 
Kevin | 9/30/08 at 9:28 am
Anyone who spends money simply based on the fact that they have a positive balance in their checking account is sure to be out of control. If you’re living to a budget, that cash balance is probably there to cover next week’s mortgage payment, or your annual property tax.
Also, outstanding transactions could get you in trouble--you can’t rely on the bank to have the most current balance because you have transactions in transit.
What we really need is the ability to check budget category balances from our electronic devices--Remote access to an on-line Quicken that tracks balances by budget category. When I see a $75 pair of shoes I want, I need to know if there’s money in the clothing budget, not if there’s $75 in my checking account.
Anyway, good start. I’d like to see a lot more from this.
kristen 
| 9/20/08 at 3:35 pm
Hey Rich - thanks for the heads up! We’re not able to recreate it on our test machine, which could mean it’s a 3G only issue. We’ll do some more testing this week to figure it out and let you know what’s up.
Rich Stefani | 9/18/08 at 3:04 pm
HELP!! I have an iPhone 3g, signed up for quickenbeam on the website (using my laptop), but when I attempt to login with my iPhone 3g (username/password), it says “Hold on while we sign you in” and then logs me off. What am I doing wrong? Thanks.
Meg A. Watt 
| 9/03/08 at 10:48 pm
Thank you, Quicken Team, for helping to de-stress a VERY stressful topic in my marriage! Quicken Beam allows me to sign up for the service and then I can forward the balances & last 5 txns to my husband so that he is aware of where we are financially and doesn’t overspend and cause overdrafts. Now we are both happy! You should share this program with marriage counselors. I am sure it would reduce their requests for appts by at least half!
Sylvia Bubenyak | 9/03/08 at 9:17 pm
Everthing went smoothly. Setting up everthing was easy.The activation email had a tip to reply to the email with BAL, so I did so to try it out. I received my message and left the room and came back to find 6 more, same info no change. Hopefully this won’t happen again since I have asked for three types of info a day and if I get 7 messages a day for each I better up my text message plan before I go over. Otherwise I think the idea is get and I will use(free or pay) it as long as I can stop getting duplicate messages.
Matt | 9/03/08 at 2:13 pm
I REALLY REALLY love the idea behind this product. I have been signed up and using it since the first week! I love the convenience and the security!
So far, things seem to work flawlessly with ONE MAJOR exception:
the balance i receive is RARELY UP-TO-DATE! for some reason i consistently get an old balance. Example, i checked my balance on 9/3 and the balance it sent me was from 8/21. This is a major flaw that basically eliminates the benefit provided!
Drew | 8/31/08 at 2:23 pm
I agree with Joe above. My bank would text my balance every Friday morning...at 5am! It woke me up and made me grumpy and I eventually dropped the feature. Please let us pick times.
Joe | 8/20/08 at 4:43 pm
Nice work! I have a few comments:
1 - if you are using an iPhone, you first have to login/register on a regular browser - there is no place to sign up using the safari app on the iPhone. (No biggie, just couldn’t use my iPhone immediately)
2 - You indicate that you send the text messages ‘In the morning’ Define that. If you send me text messages at 6AMPST (that’s 9AMEST) then I will be sad. Better yet, give me an option to state when I want delivery. i.e. Do not deliver text between X and Y hours. Twitter incorporates a similar feature, BTW.
That’s it - great work!
Joe
Michael Kendrick | 8/20/08 at 3:39 pm
Great idea and love the iPhone list view.
One minor thing to change - the image on the “Welcome to Quicken Beam!” e-mail is broken. It should be at webquickenqa.oss.intuit.com / quickenweb / images / mobile / banner_bg.gif but isn’t being loaded - possibly missing graphic or wrong location in code.
Kristen
| 9/30/08 at 11:30 am