I did not ask either bank whether or not they have a public API. I have checked both of their sites and discussed with Chase's support staff which banking applications they support. About a year or so ago when they merged with Bank One I was suddenly unable to communicate with their site via MS Money. I had been using it since about 2000 with no problems. It turns out that after the merger they began supporting only MS Money 2005(maybe 2006) or greater. This took nearly an hour on the phone with their support to determine. I asked about alternative ways to connect, if they do have a public API they keep it private.

I don't believe that they see a lot of value in a publicly available API. It is probably much easier to work with a few vendors (Quicken, Microsoft) than to worry about supporting a public API that only a small minority of its customers are likely to use. That being the case some people are bound to take it upon themselves to discover a solution. Here is one example. I ran across while researching a Perl solution to my problem.

However I would say that even if a public API was available my choice to roll my own solution seems every bit as legitimate, although possibly waste of time. I just can't understand why this question provoked such a harsh response. I am new to this community (both Perl and Perl Monks) and decided to use this problem to learn Perl because it has the motivating factor of being something I find useful. I chose Perl partly because the community seemed friendly and willing to help one another out. In fact looking in from the outside it seems to be one of Perl's biggest strengths. I guess I expected a different welcome. In any case I realize I have wandered a bit off the original topic of the post. I will not post again to his thread unless it is in response to the original question. If the moderators feel compelled to remove it I will understand.