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The Secret API of Banks

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Re: The Secret API of Banks

#31

Post by benbristow »

In the UK the fintech (Financial Tech) scene is becoming more prevalent, for the better.

Recently I switched to a new online-only bank called Monzo. It's fully licensed and all accounts are insured up to a certain amount by the UK government. It's great. They're in the top charts for apps in the UK now on the iOS App Store. There's a few other alternatives like Starling Bank and Revolut too.

They're very good. They're open about their tech stack with developer blogs and it's a modern stack which lets them iterate in a quick and agile manner unlike the legacy banks.

You get push notifications on every payment (usually you get the notification before the payment has even processed on the vendor's end!). Tells you exactly how much you've been spending every day.

They've got RESTful JSON APIs you can integrate with if you want to and they also have the option in the app to easily export your data into CSV or Quickbooks format. They even have IFTTT integration.

Really makes you manage your money better.

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#32

Post by TuringNYC »

TomMarius wrote: post #27
dddddaviddddd wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Particularly in user-facing aspects

What user facing aspects bug you the most?

I'd love:

- Universal, near-instantaneous per transaction alerts. It helps stop fraud right away rather than after-the-fact. It also helps solve problems while they are fresh rather than trying to resolve a month-old+ issue. Some countries overseas do this almost universally.

- On-restaurant-table credit card swipe rather than taking the card away and entering tip later. Many places overseas do this almost universally.

-- Side note on the txn alerts: I suppose it is due to the way Visa/MasterCard are processed, but I sometimes get alerts a day or more after i've done a credit card transaction. Some cards dont even have the option for alerts.

AMEX has great alters, almost instantaneous, but I suppose they control the entire stack, so that makes sense.

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#33

Post by JoshTriplett »

TuringNYC wrote: post #32
TomMarius wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What user facing aspects bug you the most?

I'd love: - Universal, near-instantaneous per transaction alerts. It helps stop fraud right away rather than after-the-fact. It also helps solve problems while they are fresh rather than trying to resolve a month-old+ issue. Some countries overseas do this almost universally. - On-restaurant-table credit card swipe rather than taking the card away and entering tip later. Many places overseas do this almost universall…

> - On-restaurant-table credit card swipe rather than taking the card away and entering tip later. Many places overseas do this almost universally.

This isn't a problem you can solve by changing the banking industry. This is a point-of-sale problem.

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#35

Post by kqr »

benbristow wrote: post #31

In the UK the fintech (Financial Tech) scene is becoming more prevalent, for the better. Recently I switched to a new online-only bank called Monzo. It's fully licensed and all accounts are insured up to a certain amount by the UK government. It's great. They're in the top charts for apps in the UK now on the iOS App Store. There's a few other alternatives like Starling Bank and Revolut too. They're very good. They'r…

This is, on one hand, great. I made the switch to a similar bank myself a few years back.

What I failed to realise at the time was how exposed I became to the vulnerabilities associated with being cashless. Cash is not just an ancient relic. Cash is an ancient relic and a fundamental component of a free society.

My country has, in practise, become nearly cashless and I used to be proud to be one of the very early adopters of that mindset. Now I lament how hard it is to deal in cash.

I am planning to switch to the only bank left in my country still providing personal cash services. The only one. That should be scary, not relieving.

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#36

Post by WilliamEdward »

VikingCoder wrote: post #20

I hate sounding like a VC jerk, but the banking industry needs some serious disruption.

I had a similar idea, so I looked up the process for starting a bank. There's a good reason fresh-faced startup VCs can't get into it.

- Extremely high starting capital requirements (10-100 million USD)

- Knowledge on security, finance, and law, means you will be needing an expert team of lawyers, accountants, cryptographers, etc.

- An actual location and strictly controlled building to keep the physical money.

There are a lot more requirements but the first 3 make it almost impossible for a lay-man to start their own bank.

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#37

Post by kozziollek »

dewey wrote: post #8

For those in the EU there's something interesting coming next year, banks need to provide open API to interact with each other: https://thenextweb.com/worldofbanking/2018/06/27/openbanking... Already right now in Germany there are a lot of banks that share a common API format which is why there are a lot of banking apps where you can just log into your bank and don't need bank specific apps. It's called HBCI / FinTS…

Similar thing in Poland: https://polishapi.org/en/

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#38

Post by orf »

misterbwong wrote: post #18

This is very clever but makes me sad. It’s 2018 and the best, cleanest way of monitoring and storing my own transactions programmatically is by scraping an email.

*in America

Banks provide an API in Europe. In fact it's a legal requirement that's coming into force in 2019, and there are a lot of 'mobile-first' banks like Monzo and Revolut which make this entirely un-needed in the first place (providing spending exports, decent analytics, push notifications, etc etc).

Welcome to the future. Contact your local politician if you want to join us. Maybe also ask about chip and pin while you're at it!

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#39

Post by spookthesunset »

TomMarius wrote: post #27
dddddaviddddd wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Particularly in user-facing aspects

What user facing aspects bug you the most?

- Instant, ultra-low cost inner-bank transfers. None of this "wait a day (or more)" ACH business or "send money via paypal, but then have to wait a day (or more) to ACH it into a real bank account". Useful for everything from paying friends back to moving money between two personal accounts.

- ubiquitous NFC-based payment systems

Re: The Secret API of Banks

#40

Post by spookthesunset »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #33
TuringNYC wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love: - Universal, near-instantaneous per transaction alerts. It helps stop fraud right away rather than after-the-fact. It also helps solve problems while they are fresh rather than trying to resolve a month-old+ issue. Some countries overseas do this almost universally. - On-restaurant-table credit card swipe rather than taking the card away and entering tip later. Many places overseas do this almost universall…

> - On-restaurant-table credit card swipe rather than taking the card away and entering tip later. Many places overseas do this almost universally. This isn't a problem you can solve by changing the banking industry. This is a point-of-sale problem.

> This isn't a problem you can solve by changing the banking industry. This is a point-of-sale problem.

It's all part of a larger set of "problems with US financial services". The fact that it is technically different vendors is not relevant...

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