FinTech is showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon. With both large financial companies and small tech start-ups increasing their investment into FinTech, here’s a few of the next big things to keep an eye on.
Automatic savings and round-up apps
Opening a savings account is something often drilled into us as a ‘must-do’ in our twenties; but for most, the idea of saving can be a chore. Thankfully, for those people there is now a solution! A range of banking apps have been looking at upgrading their features to make saving easy and automatic.
These apps help you to effectively manage your money and allow you to round up your transactions to the nearest pound. The app then saves the difference into a savings or investment account, so you hardly notice that you are saving at all.
Voice technology
With 10 percent of UK households now having virtual home assistants like Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant, it’s no surprise that voice technology is changing the way we bank too. Many of us already operate our music, lights, TV and other home technology by speaking, so keep your eyes peeled as you may soon be able to send payments this way as well.
Banks are beginning to roll this functionality out slowly, however the tasks you’ll be able to do with your voice are set to be fairly limited. You should be able to do things like find out your latest transactions soon enough, but with the added security risks, features like transferring money and applying for mortgages might take longer to develop.
Digital-only banks will continue to grow
High street banks are set to continue to feel the heat from digital-only banks who provide simple, innovative products and services. As today’s tech-savvy person requires information in an instant, traditional banks are set to disappear due to the availability of functions and services being more readily available via digital banks.
A common misconception about online banking is that it’s not as safe as traditional banking. This isn’t the case. Online banks take the same (if not more) security measures to protect your money and your data, including the use of one-time passcodes and additional security questions.
If traditional banks and banking services aren’t prepared to embrace FinTech, they will likely get left behind, and quickly. This incredibly fast-moving sector is in the midst of changing the way we do many things when it comes to our money. Will you be embracing the advancements?