Lightning Review: Pageonce – A Personal Assistant

(Lightning Reviews are back! This time courtesy of — Badmofo63 who gives us a look at Pageonce (FREE at the iTunes Store). Want your Lightning Review elevated to our front page — with a tasty 25% TiPb Store discount prize to top it off? Get the details, choose and App, and make with the reviewing! And if you’re looking for a good example for what kind of reviews we like, this is a great one!)

Take it away, Badmofo63: Like many of us, I conduct much of my business online whenever possible. The beauty of the iPhone is that is can facilitate so much of that business with the embedded apps and its exceptional Safari browser. But let’s face it, on my original 2G iPhone, it’s excruciatingly slow to check bank balances, check bills, check on friends, and whatnot. Even on Wi-Fi (or 3G for you lucky stiffs) that’s a lot of page browsing.

Enter Pageonce. This app is a lifesaver for me. With one click, I can see the status of nearly all my online accounts. There are a large number of companies supported and nearly all the popular ones, like MySpace, eBay, most banks & financial institutions, etc. There is a tremendous amount of information displayed such as transactions and amounts, friend updates, phone usage and billing data, etc. The app was very stable on my 4GB 2.0.1 iPhone (stop making fun of me!!).

I found about 90% of my online accounts. The updates feature shows changes to the previous day, which is very helpful in watching credit cards and bank balances. However, you can only VIEW the data from your accounts; you cannot manipulate or change it.

Setting up the application is easy, although the majority of it has to be done on the Pageonce website, not in the app. The data is kept safe using military level security including 256-bit data encryption, including the data transferred between the Pageonce server and your iPhone.

What’s good: its one stop for many shops and you can quickly see recent changes that occur from day to day. The security of your information is enhanced by not having to login multiple times and the encryption protection of the data itself. Should you lose your phone, you can block access from mobile devices.

What could be improved: While I found 90% of my information to be available, I want 100%. I expect that this will occur over time and Pageonce does have a means to suggest additions and notify you when it is available. Also, since you can’t make changes to the accounts, if you do need to go to the provider website, a link would be helpful for single click access to it.

All in all… terrific app. I love it and use it frequently. The cost was FREE!!