A new transfer experience

We know many of you work in the high-tech industry, and spend plenty of time cultivating a best-in-class user experience for your company’s customers. You know a good user experience when you see one.

Until recently, in order to fund a new account, members were required to manually input financial information such as the name of their bank, account number and routing number. This process was not the best user experience, and it took too much time. Once new members had completed their part of the transaction, the money would still take several days to appear in the new account.

To fix these issues we integrated with a company named Plaid. Now, members can simply select their financial institution from a list and enter the username and password associated with their accounts. Plaid enables them to connect to more than 11,000 financial institutions around the world—often in only a matter of seconds. Additionally, during the account-funding step, we can now verify that the outside account being connected belongs to the member attempting to connect it. This reduces the risk of fraud, thus saving First Tech and members’ money.

Plaid also enables members to check the balance in external accounts before processing a transfer. Previously, members couldn’t see the balance in their originating account, and neither could First Tech. This resulted in unsuccessful transfers and, potentially, non-sufficient funds fees. Now, members can see a list of available accounts, along with account balances. This allows them to select the account from which they want to transfer funds and choose an amount they’re most comfortable with.

This new experience is not only limited to new members, try it out today when you fund a new account.