BBVA explores solutions from Afterbanks to improve the bank’s financial aggregation platform

Pablo Fernández Armirotti, project manager for Enterprise Clients at BBVA, initially made contact with Afterbanks to collaborate on a proof-of-concept, having recognised the technical potential of the startup’s offering. Launched out of Madrid, Afterbanks is a banking aggregation service catering to the Spanish market and acts as an API that allows customers to view all of their financial details from different banks, regardless of country, in one place.

Afterbanks has also been trialled in the US, Canada and some Latin American markets, such as Chile and Mexico. “We initiated the contact with Afterbanks through our partners at BBVA Global companies,” said Fernández. “We have been interested in the way in which they access customer information, providing quite a different solution from those offered by similar suppliers.” The method in this case was screen-scraping – the process of translating or sharing data from one app to another, with the benefit to the customer that they can receive guidance or analysis on their account expenditure.

Convinced that the technical solution offered by Afterbanks was a good option for BBVA and impressed by the company’s knowledge, Fernández started a fast-track testing process. “We discovered that the technical solution responded to the needs we were considering,” he said. “In the proof of concept, we needed to check the response times to retrieve the information, and that the data we collected was correct.”

Fernández was full of praise for the team at Afterbanks and enjoyed the process of working with them. “Our working relationship with Afterbanks on the proof-of-concept has been very dynamic, and we have been able to verify the hypotheses that we had raised in the defined deadlines.”

Fernández explained the benefits of a corporate and a startup joining forces, he called it an enriching experience, with both parties offering different skillsets. “You can reach processes of ideation and put them into the hands of customers, with a lot of added value,” says Fernández. Since startups have a lot of agility in the response, they have knowledge to work with many other clients, and banks have customers and the experience of their needs – between the two we managed to reach high quality products and ahead of time.”

With Afterbanks integrated into BBVA during the proof-of-concept, the new system is set to deliver a higher quality service for customers that will run smoother with more stability. Despite its success, progress on the pilot has been paused for now. Looking ahead to the potential of the corporate-startup relationship in the banking sector, Fernández said that the end goal is all about “improving the customer experience, so that it’s simple.” Getting this right will ultimately lead to a better relationship between the bank and the customer. “The service should alert customers to those things they need and reduce the time spent going back and forth with the bank,” he added. “This will allow them to spend more energy on their business and optimise their finances at all times.”