Recent research from leading open banking provider Yolt Technology Services (YTS) revealed over 50% of business leaders within banking, retail, lending, investment platforms and PFMs, are not utilising open banking technology due to concerns around data security and privacy.

In response, YTS has today announced it is using Amazon Web Services (AWS) to deliver the highest level of security across its open banking services. Using AWS, YTS is able to quickly scale, which is a critical to the business - which last year celebrated its 1 billionth API request and is continuing to grow rapidly.

Using AWS, YTS is able to encrypt all the sensitive data it processes both in motion and at rest, to safeguard and maintain the confidentiality and integrity of the information being processed. A range of security controls is configured to provide a completely bespoke range of access and permissions to the data. This ensures the highest protection for user’s data and enforces the strictest security standards.

“Open Banking has already transformed the way millions of consumers manage their personal finances and use their data. From the survey, we see a big interest in open banking, but also some big concerns with how the data is stored,” says Roderick Simons, Chief Technology Officer at YTS. “The research demonstrated that respondents who are interested in open banking have questions and uncertainties around data security, data sharing, and the open banking model.”

“Due to the nature of data being transferred via YTS, security is naturally paramount to us. More holistically though, utilising the AWS Cloud is so important to the open banking industry as a whole, as it lifts confidence in security across the board, and will hopefully help to drive greater adoption of open banking by businesses and consumers alike.”

Simons continues: “Using AWS will help us to meet the most stringent security, compliance, and regulatory requirements and help us tackle any uncertainty our customers may have about how their data is stored and treated. With AWS we have created a scalable, secure cloud environment that meets our security needs, whilst still allowing us to grow and scale our business.”

IOWArocks, the global marketplace for data, tech, and services, today adds OWL Analytics to their rapidly expanding data marketplace. OWL Analytics is an alternative data company that focuses on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) research. They help investors integrate ESG data into their investment solutions with the goal of delivering enhanced investment results and positive social impact compared to benchmarks. 

OWL ESG aggregates hundreds of sources of ESG data and research to create company scores and rankings based on a stronger foundation of data, optimized to increase objectivity. They cover over 25,000 public companies across the world, publishing metrics monthly rather than yearly, providing more actionable data that can be integrated into real world portfolios. OWL ESG scores and ranks companies against their peers across thirty core metrics, including twelve key performance indicators that quantify company behaviour important to society. OWL ESG provides detailed company specific data on numerous ESG issues, controversial revenue screens, countries of concern, and UN Global Compact compliance.

Ben Webster, OWL Analytics, commented, "Across the world there is a huge focus on sustainability, and rightly so, but more specifically both financial firms and corporates are now faced with facilitating the impending SFDR enforcement. The new SFDR regulation requires financial market participants and financial advisers to provide clients and investors with certain ESG-related information in relation to the provision of their services. It also includes the marketing of certain financial products, using the mandatory disclosure templates (where applicable). This in hand with the EU Taxonomy, is aimed at helping investors understand whether an economic activity is environmentally sustainable, is driving massively increased demand for reliable and regular ESG data. For us to meet demand we fully recognise the need to partner with like-minded firms In the Industry. IOWArocks presents an exciting new channel to market and unlike some of the other data marketplaces they are built on a strong foundation of proven technology solutions. This bodes well for us and we are looking forward to what's next!" 

Paul Watmough, IOWArocks CEO & Co-Founder, commented, "I am delighted to welcome OWL Analytics to our growing community. Their focus on ESG is very relevant right now and I can only see this space growing in the future. I am looking forward to opening our data consumer audience to these new and exciting datasets. A wise move for everyone involved!"

Twenty7Tec have launched their latest Mortgage Market Report for April.  You can view the report here:  https://www.twenty7tec.com/news/mortgage-market-report-april-2021/

Key takeaways include:

• 71.3%* Purchases as a proportion of the mortgage market in April 2021 (remortgages = 28.7%) *Excluding product transfers.
• 60% Products available as of April 30 2021 as a percentage of products available as of Feb 28 2020.
• 12 The 12 busiest days ever for ESIS documents for 95%+ products were in April 2021.
• 8s One ESIS document produced every 8s, all day, every day in April 2021. 
• 22.5% First time buyers made up over 22.5% of the mortgage searches in April 2021.
• 20% By end April 2021, 95%+ searches accounted for more than one in five of all mortgage searches on our systems.
• 3.6 In April 2021, average searches per document produced dropped to 3.6, the long term average.
• 30/6 The end of the stamp duty free period effect is affecting volumes above £250k already. Mortgage search volumes for properties over £250k are already dropping.

James Tucker, CEO of Twenty7Tec, said:

“In April, we saw the baton passed. In order to hit the end June deadline, most mortgages will have been processed by end April. Hence a dip in volumes in some segments of the market. However, overall volumes remained high because on April 19, the Government's 95% guarantee scheme kicked in and volumes took off.

The 95%+ scheme is a longer term play to keep the FTB market active and appears, to date, to be working. Let's see what May brings us.”

Do please get in touch if you need anything else.

Fisher Scientific Europe, part of Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., celebrates its 20^th anniversary as part of the Tungsten Network.

Thermo Fisher Scientific began its e-invoicing journey in 2001 as one of Tungsten Network’s first customers. Its e-invoicing initiative, which sits within its European team, began the digitisation journey to ensure compliance and improve productivity and efficiency within its business. Looking after 3,000 suppliers, one-million invoices per year, and utilising one Enterprise Resource Planning system, the team has leveraged Tungsten Network solutions to guide their automation efforts.

In the last five years, Fisher Scientific Europe has further renewed its commitment to digitisation. Under the leadership of Fabienne Pierrot, Finance Director, Accounting and Audit, Fisher Scientific Europe grew to a level of 50% e-invoicing in three years and became 37% more productive in less than four.

Describing the impact within her Accounts Payable (“AP”) team, Fabienne Pierrot explains: “After the Tungsten implementation, we experienced a vast reduction in the number of suppliers requiring support regarding lost or unpaid invoices. All Tungsten suppliers’ invoices are paid on time. Partnering with Tungsten has allowed the strategy in the AP team to move from a transactional focus to an analytical one, and my team is working on projects that add real value to the organisation.”

As its e-invoicing initiative matured, Fisher Scientific Europe experienced difficulty adhering to changing country and industry specific mandates and began working with Tungsten Network to better automate and digitise its regulatory compliance efforts. In 2019, Fisher Scientific Europe enlisted Tungsten Network to work on its largest compliance project to date in Italy, ensuring total compliance of all invoices in the rapidly changing regulatory landscape.

Ruud van Hilten, SVP, Country Compliance at Tungsten Network commented: “Fisher Scientific Europe, like many global businesses, were looking for a trusted partner to help them prepare for Italy’s mandate. They were particularly concerned about the complexity of their systems and needed a custom solution that met their exact specifications. By working with Fabienne and her team, we were able to produce a solution that ensured compliance with the regulatory requirements.

“After successfully establishing our custom compliance solution with their private customers, Fisher Scientific realised so much value that they then decided to expand the scope of the project to include public sector customers as well.” 

Andrew Lemonofides, CEO of Tungsten Network, says, “As one of Tungsten Network’s first customers, we are delighted to celebrate this milestone anniversary. Fisher Scientific Europe was an early adopter of e-invoicing, and its continued commitment to digitisation has resulted in increased overall business efficiency, which enables its employees to spend more time on strategic projects that add real value back into the business. We are incredibly proud of their success and look forward to continuing our partnership for years to come.”  

Bhavin Patel - Founder and CEO, LenDenClub 

Bhavin is the Founder and CEO of LenDenClub – India’s largest peer-to-peer lending platform.  With a decade long experience in the financial services sector, he has worked across diverse  verticals - lending business; operations, ERP solutions, fundraising, credit automation among  others. 

Having co-founded Span Analytics, an NBFC consulting business in the past, Bhavin has  effectively steered NBFCs to achieve scalable operations while helping them raise funds  through securitization. He nurtures the belief that lending automation can play a huge role in the  financial inclusion goal in India which has laid the cornerstone for LenDenClub. He enjoys  interacting and exchanging ideas with young minds, and thus regularly conducts guest lectures  at renowned B-schools. An engineer by profession Bhavin holds a PGDM in Marketing &  Finance from Kirloskar Institute of Advanced Management Studies, a top-ranked Indian  business school. He is an avid footballer and regularly participates in corporate tournaments. 

FinecoBank today announced funds from AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM) are now available on its investing platform.

The addition of funds from the asset manager will further strengthen Fineco’s ESG offering, and enable its growing customer base in the United Kingdom greater access to a range of sustainable investing products.

AXA IM, part of AXA Group, is a responsible asset manager, actively investing for the long-term to help its clients, its people and the world to prosper, with strategies ranging across equities, fixed income, multi-asset and alternatives. ESG is integrated into more than 90% of its core assets (equity, fixed income and multi-asset).

The latest announcement follows a string of sustainably-focussed fund additions to Fineco’s online platform, with the introduction of funds from NinetyOne and Candriam announced already this year.

Paolo Di Grazia, deputy general manager, Fineco: “Responsible investing is becoming increasingly important to our customers, and this is why it is so important that we continue to partner with asset managers that are committed to driving environmental and social change through their investments. We know that the introduction of AXA IM will be highly welcomed by our customers, especially with the added benefit of Fineco’s competitive and transparent prices.”

John Stainsby, Head of Core Client Group UK, AXA Investment Managers, said: “We are delighted to offer funds from our UK range to Fineco’s customer base, so they can tap into 20 years of our responsible investing experience. Half of all new funds launched in the UK now have some form of ESG built into the investment process. ESG is no longer an industry trend, it is the new normal, and a basic requirement for a growing number of investors.”

Intelligent Automation (IA) is set to become the latest technology buzzword in the financial sector, with 94% of finance professionals stating they are looking to implement the technology. Despite this, 50% of finance professionals do not understand the technology or the benefits it can bring, according to the latest Fintech Barometer study conducted by Visma | Onguard, leaders in providing solutions for the order-to-cash process. The study, which is now in its fourth year, tracks attitudes and challenges impacting the financial sector, surveying more than 1000 finance professionals in the UK annually.

Defined as a combination of artificial intelligence and automation, IA improves efficiency by processing huge amounts of data automatically. Implementation is not just an IT concern, but requires a change in the way businesses work, bringing together humans and technology to accelerate and improve processes that previously could not be automated for better business results.

Marieke Saeij, CEO at Visma | Onguard comments: "It’s a fascinating finding that finance professionals want to implement Intelligent Automation in their organisation, despite the majority admitting they’re unaware of what it is all about. IA is the automation of business processes that are not repetitive or predictable, where some degree of intelligence, either pre-programmed or artificial, is used to achieve the best outcome. At Visma | Onguard, we can only applaud the ambition of finance professionals to implement emerging technologies such as these. However, these findings reveal that we have a clear role to help every finance professional understand what IA is and how it can add value to their organisation. After all, this growing trend makes the work of every finance professional a lot easier, leaving more room for them to add value to the organisation."

The roadmap to implementation

For those businesses planning to implement this technology, the planned timeframe for adoption varies with 37% of professionals indicating that they are working on a 1-2 year strategy for adoption, and only 3% thinking they will implement it within a year. This hesitancy to implement is reflected by the overwhelm being felt due to the volume and variety of data now available to finance professionals, with 41% finding effectively combining outputs from the many different data sources (both external and internal) the biggest challenge when it comes to becoming data-driven.

As part of IA, the survey found that uptake of Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and robotisation also remains modest, with only 21% of finance professionals currently using the technology in their systems. Its potential however is promising, and adoption could be on the rise with 40% saying they are developing ideas on how to integrate RPA or robotisation, with a further 21% in the exploratory phase.

The Emerging Payments Association (EPA), which promotes collaboration and innovation across payments, has today released its thought leadership piece, ‘Customer Disputers: A review of Chargebacks and Double Credits’ in partnership with Chargebacks911 and Fi911.

The whitepaper seeks to shine a light on the unprecedented rise in customers claiming ‘double credits’ through chargebacks and alternative avenues, while also providing recommendations on how to improve the customer dispute process for all stakeholders in the payments value chain.

Traditionally, customer disputes and chargebacks have rarely received the focus and coverage they deserve, however one Tier 1 Debit and Credit Card Issuer reported the number of non-fraud dispute cases increased by 333%. Protections associated with card payments were scarcely fully understood outside of a small group of specialists until the COVID-19 pandemic forced holidays, flights, hotels, concerts, theatres, and entertainment events into cancellation and postponement in 2020.

On average, cases of ‘double credits’, where a customer is refunded through a chargeback claim and an alternative avenue, increased by 15% to 20% in 2020. The surge forced issuers to bring in more resources and grow their customer dispute teams, while the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) has been forced to investigate over 10,000 customer disputes since March 2020.

Between January and February 2021, the EPA conducted extensive primary research through detailed stakeholder interviews on ‘double credits’. Interviewees included over 25 subject matter experts, as well as representatives of international payment networks, card issuers of all sizes, merchant acquirers, specialist technology providers, merchants, and trade associations.

A key area of focus was investigating whether customers were receiving ‘double credits’ for disputed transactions, as well as whether there are cases of deliberate financial fraud, as criminals become increasingly aware of how to manipulate the dispute process.

The report also seeks to identify best practices and makes 10 key recommendations with a view to improving efficiencies in managing and mitigating future chargebacks. The recommendations included: Improving communications and collaboration across all stakeholders, establishing a customer dispute working group, stronger guidelines for paying credits and increased data sharing.

Jane Jee, Chair at Kompli-Global and Project Financial Crime leader at the EPA, said: “This whitepaper emphasises that, yet again, appropriate data sharing and collaboration are key to preventing fraudulent duplicate claims. We hope that the recommendations will be studied by the card schemes and the regulators and that action will be taken to increase efficiency and prevent fraud in this area.”

Monica Eaton-Cardone, COO and Co-Founder of Chargebacks911 and Fi911, added: “We are proud to have worked with the EPA to shine a spotlight on an issue which is impacting stakeholders right across the payments value chain. We have the data to show that the issue of ‘double credits’ has risen to unprecedented levels during the pandemic, particularly in the U.K. and the U.S., and the associated costs are putting companies out of business. This must change.”

To download a copy of the guide, please visit: https://www.emergingpayments.org/whitepaper/customer-disputes-a-review-of-chargebacks-and-double-credits-an-epa-whitepaper/

For more information on the work and services of the EPA you can visit: www.emergingpayments.org you can speak directly to the EPA at: info@emergingpayments.org

Tide, the UK’s leading business financial platform^[1], has announced it will launch a new Invoice Assistant in mid-May to give small businesses the tools they need to get paid, and get paid on time.

The negative impact of late payments on small businesses has been well documented, with Tide’s research revealing that small businesses spend 1.5 hours per day, on average, chasing late payments and that each small business has an average of £8,500 owed to them in late payments at any one time*. Tide has also found that it’s members spend 3 - 4 hours per week on creating invoices and managing expenses on spreadsheets**. That is a lot of wasted time and causes a lot of stress.

Tide is addressing these pain points with a package of tools and services to help small businesses reduce time spent on getting paid and reconciling payments. The Tide Invoice Assistant includes:

• Automatic invoice chasing - automated reminder emails for unpaid invoices
• Automatic invoice matching - notifications sent as soon as you are paid, payments automatically linked to invoices for easy bookkeeping
• Invoice Direct Debits - get paid automatically as soon as the invoice is due (provided by GoCardless)
• Invoice protection - protect yourself against the risk of non-payment (insurance provided by Hokodo)

The Invoice Assistant will cost £10 + VAT per month and is an add-on to the free invoice raising service available to all Tide members. 

Testing of the automatic invoice chasing feature has revealed that invoices are paid at least 4 days earlier when they are chased by an automatic email. 

Alaastair Travis, VP of Business Services at Tide said: “The Tide Invoice Assistant tackles a number of pain points experienced by small businesses - most importantly, automating manual and time consuming processes and giving reassurance that they will be paid promptly. The automatic chasing feature is a particularly important addition the Tide platform, with small business owners often feeling uncomfortable chasing their clients for payment, an automated email allows a degree separation from the personal relationship and helps keep cashflow on track.”

Tide’s Invoice Assistant is the UK’s first all-in-one automated invoicing solution that helps small business owners maximise their chances of getting paid on time, minimises the chances of not being paid, and saves them time on repetitive tasks.

Laurence Kreiger, CEO - UK, Tide said: “Tide’s mission is to save small business owners time (and money) on their banking and admin, so they can focus on running and growing their business. Nothing could be more true to this mission than helping our members to get paid, and to get paid on time, protecting their valuable time and their cashflow.

“The addition of the Invoice Assistance to the Tide platform demonstrates our move towards providing a fully comprehensive financial platform, offering a suite of highly connected products that help our members manage all aspects of financial admin, not just their banking needs.”