We’re excited to announce the launch of the MercMoney® Chatbot, the first conversational banking engine which offers customers at the Mercantile Bank of Michigan a new way to engage with their money and receive fast answers to common personal finance questions through the latest voice-and-messaging platforms.

Why launch a Conversational Banking Chatbot?

The MercMoney® Chatbot allows users to access their financial information directly through three voice and messaging platforms: Google Home, Facebook Messenger, and SMS. Once securely logged in, users can get information about their account balances, progress on savings goals, and specific prior transactions.

“At Mercantile we want to do everything we can to support our customers, and that starts by re-thinking how we deliver relevant and timely financial insights that shape day-to-day financial decisions. That’s why we decided to expand accessibility by meeting them in the voice-and-messaging channels they are already using on a daily basis,” said John Schulte, Chief Information Officer.

“To do this we’ve partnered with Abe AI, to expand the functionality of our personal financial management tools into Google Home, SMS (text-messaging), and Messenger. We want to make the management of money feel more like a conversation, rather than a chore.”

“This is the most sophisticated conversational banking interface available today from any financial institution,” said Rob Guilfoyle, CEO of Abe AI. “Being able to say, ‘How much do I have left in my grocery budget this month?’ or even make a new savings goal just by talking to my Google Home – that’s groundbreaking, and has the potential to transform the way we interact with our finances, taking away some of the potential intimidation, and making them simpler and more approachable.”

Abe AI launches the first #conversational #banking engine with Mercantile Bank of Michigan. #fintech Click To Tweet

What can the Chatbot do?

You can ask MercMoney® all sorts of questions about your money, including account balances, spending, savings, budgets, recent transactions and more.

We’re constantly adding to the MercMoney Chatbot, but you can try a few of the sample questions below:

• “What’s my account balance?”
• “What’s my latest transaction?”
• “Recent spending on restaurants”
• “What’s my net worth?”
• “What was my income last month?”
• “How’s my spending?”
• “What did I spend on coffee last month?”
• “How’s my shopping budget?”
• “Where is the nearest ATM?”
• “What’s the Mercantile routing number?”
• “What’s a money order?”

Users can also create new savings goals, create budgets, and get general information about the bank, such as hours, nearest location, and bank services. The ability to securely and directly access account and transaction data through these voice-and-messaging platforms is unprecedented. Together with Mercantile Bank of Michigan, Abe AI is giving users the ease of managing their financial lives conveniently through the platforms they’re already using, as well as a clearer picture of their financial health and habits.

Watch this video to learn more about what you can do with the MercMoney Chatbot on Google Home.

Want to try it out?

If you’re not a Mercantile Bank of Michigan customer with a MercMoney account, you won’t be able to access specific financial information, but you’ll still be able to get some of the more general information about the bank. The MercMoney® page gives specific instructions about getting set up on each platform, but it’s particularly simple to get started with Google Home – just say “Ok Google, talk to MercMoney,” or send a message to MercMoney through Facebook Messenger.

If you’re a customer, once MercMoney® is enabled and you have all your accounts loaded, it will begin to track your transactions, categorize them, create budgets, spending, and cash flow analysis, as well as providing tools to measure your net worth and plan to pay off debt.

Mercantile Bank of Michigan and Abe AI are making it simple and convenient for customers to gain control over their financial lives through the platforms they're already on. #fintech #banking Click To Tweet

Is this secure?

Your security is always central to us and is an integral part of all of our services, no matter what device or platform you use to access your accounts. The MercMoney® Chatbot uses the same login as the online banking site to authenticate your device, and we don’t share access to your financial information with third parties in providing the service.

Our goal is to provide financial institutions with market-leading voice-and-messaging solutions following our “Crawl, Walk, Run,” approach that allows FIs to experiment with popular voice-and-messaging interfaces then grow into more advanced capabilities over time. We help financial institutions, of all sizes, get to market quickly with products that reduce costs, increase engagement and, more importantly, support long-term financial wellness for consumers.

Learn how you can get your credit union on the fastest growing messaging platform today.