Ask HN: What would you do with a bank API?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8636985

by smt88 • 12 years ago

7 15 12 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

What would you do if all banks had open APIs? What problems would you solve and for whom?

(I've worked for banks and am aware of how hypothetical this is. Just humor me.)

FroshKiller2• 12 years ago

You really need to put some boundaries on this. How far does it go? Are we talking about, like, an API for customers to check their balances? Or are we talking about an API for creating new accounts and pre-qualifying for loans? An API for transfers? What?

smt88• 12 years ago

Anything/everything that a bank does. Account management, transfers, payments, etc.

FroshKiller2• 12 years ago

From a personal banking standpoint, I think it'd be nice to have a sort of overlay on my account that helps me budget by breaking my balance up into buckets, categorizing my withdrawals, and straightlining my income. I imagine that with sophisticated service discovery (e.g. common loan options), an interface like that could recommend additional services that would help me that I might not know about otherwise.

interlock• 12 years ago

Oh man, I just ranted about this at work.

* Transferring money to our clients would ideally be one uniform API request. Globally speaking, moving money around can still be complicated depending on what your business does, how much money you are transferring and the origin/destination. API's could enable a new level of communication about moving money around that could satisfy many countries needs to track/audit about money transfers while making it easier for businesses to actually do it. * Reconciliation of statements with whatever software you use. Right now, there are a lot of different formats for getting account statements. Our bank's commercial services doesn't actually provide a standard format at all. They have a CSV like TXT file that has not documentation and that only Sage Accounting can read. Brilliant! An Open API could allow us to query an account and format out in any standard format we need; or, even better, just directly hook up to our accounting software (Xero) and be done with it. * Integrations. Most integrations are giant hacks right now that simulate a browser logging in with your full access password and download statements/etc. API's could provision access to specific end-points and be revoked. It would greatly enhance security all around. * Automation. Our business pays our our customers on a weekly basis, but it would be awesome if we just checked a box "Approved" and it did all the magic of moving money around. * There are literally some things we need to call our bank to do, but are really just operations their web interface doesn't allow us to do. Ideally, an API would allow us to write our own flow to complete these same operations without bothering our bank.

Honestly, the less I have to deal with any bank with our startup the happier I am.

Startup idea: Create a tech specific credit union that exposes a straightforward API to do banking. Expand to integrations with popular online accounting software and eventually personal banking. Starting from scratch would hopefully let you build a front facing service that is modern.

mcherm• 12 years ago

I just wanted to say, I work for a bank, on the team that is building APIs for public consumption. I will be very interested in seeing the responses that are posted here.

In other words, it may not be as hypothetical as you think.

davismwfl• 12 years ago

I'd love to see it.

Build a product that allows a consumer to see all their account data in a single dashboard for review and analytics. Do analysis on spending habits, deposit trends, where are investments, how are the investments doing etc. Many people have a very hard time understanding exactly where they stand because they have multiple accounts, investments etc and it is nearly impossible to get a real time view of it.

Add to that the ability to print a financial standing document that could be used by banks and loan companies to help determine credit eligibility. I am thinking about saving time as most banks have people provide a few months of bank statements etc, and provide funds proof when getting mortgages and other loans.

sharemywin• 12 years ago

Huge for small business, investors, etc. Person A can only spend xyz amount per month and only to these vendors. Text me if the amount of the deposit last night doesn't match what my point of sale system says. Only send x amount of money to y company once person A and person B agree.

codegeek• 12 years ago

If banks had open API, here is what I will do:

- Create my own UI. Most bank UIs suck big time. Categorizing accounts, labeling them as we want etc. and yes, I don't want to do this through a third party like Mint. Also, when i see a transaction, I want better descriptions if possible. Don't show me "VISA charge" as a description, really ? I always wonder if merchants have better descrioptions and banks just make it more "cryptic" for security reasons ?

- Connect to accounting system directly. Ability to export data in csv,json etc format

- Being able to "send" money to someone easily. This exists already with banks but each one of them have clunky UIs if at all. I would build my own :)

xpto123• 12 years ago

If they all used the same API? You could build your own mobile UI themeable product and sell them to banks for them to host in their own servers.

Build a company around the product and provide change requests/maintenance services, further branding the app, etc.

ssanders822• 12 years ago

I have an automated trading system which places stock trades through my broker's API (Interactive Brokers).

However, I also trade my Wells Fargo IRA with the same system - since there's no API, this requires a very fragile Selenium-based system wherein my code opens Firefox, logs in, and navigates the correct sequence to place a stock market order. Of course, it also breaks about every three months when Wells Fargo changes their page layout.

pdx• 12 years ago

So, why not move your Wells Fargo IRA over to Interactive Brokers? I have a normal account and an IRA account with them.

https://www.interactivebrokers.com/en/index.php?f=iraInforma...

ssanders822• 12 years ago

Good question... 1.) I get 100 free trades per year in each account at WF 2.) I also use WF for all my checking and business accounts, and I have the PMA package which is better support, low fees, etc but requires me to keep at least $25k with WF

logn• 12 years ago

ClairMail was a company that provided off-the-shelf mobile banking. Banks essentially needed to just implement their API. ClairMail was acquired by Monitise. So if you're looking to actually make an open API, you could acquire Montise, or more likely, approach each of their customers and ask to be a consumer of their mobile API (which would be no small task given federal regulations).

http://www.monitise.com/americas/customers/index.php

sebst• 12 years ago

If they had? Isn't there something like FinTS[1] in other countries than Germany?

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FinTS

zhte415• 12 years ago

There is a standard API. It is called SWIFT. SWIFT is not just a network, but a standard message format. Participants in the SWIFT network can also receive messages from outside the SWIFT network.

Ask HN: What would you do with a bank API?

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