Revolut: transforming digital finance

With TrueLayer, Revolut enables customers to manage all of their finances from a single app.

Revolut’s ambition is to build a truly global bank that enables people to manage all of their finances seamlessly from one place. To achieve this, they needed an easy way to connect their app to external bank accounts, and a payment method that eliminated high transaction fees. This led them to TrueLayer.

“

We see TrueLayer as a world leader in the open banking space. Like us, they have an aggressive roadmap that touches many different aspects of open banking. This, coupled with an incredibly smart team, made TrueLayer a great match for us.

Joshua Fernandes

Open Banking Product Owner

The challenge

Most Revolut customers have a high street bank account alongside their Revolut account. This made it difficult for them to get a complete view of their finances without having to log into multiple websites and apps.

Another problem for Revolut and its customers was the cost and complexity associated with adding funds to a Revolut account. Topping up using traditional methods such as manual bank transfers was time-consuming for customers, requiring them to log into their external bank’s website or app to set up and initiate a payment. While adding funds using a credit or debit card was also a disjointed experience for customers and came with a high-risk of fraud and additional transaction fees for Revolut. 

The Revolut team were looking for a way to fix these broken processes which ultimately resulted in unnecessary costs and mismatched financial products for customers. They also wanted to contextually introduce customers to the new financial products that Revolut had to offer in a way that was tailored to the needs of each customer. Using TrueLayer, Revolut were able to instantly leverage open banking to do this.

“

We were looking for a way to fix broken processes which ultimately result in unnecessary costs and mismatched financial products for our customers. We also wanted to contextually introduce users to the new financial products that Revolut has to offer in a way that was tailored to the needs of each customer. With TrueLayer we were able to instantly leverage open banking to do this.

Joshua Fernandes

Open Banking Product Owner

The solution

First, the team began using TrueLayer’s Data API, enabling their customers to connect their external bank accounts to Revolut in a few clicks. This gave customers greater visibility and control over spending and budgeting. This also meant Revolut could recommend new products to help customers save on things like loans, credit cards, overdrafts, and international transfers. Delivering a seamless experience to Revolut’s UK retail and business customers was hugely important. The team wanted customers to get instant value from the wide variety of new features they were building.

Next, Revolut began using TrueLayer’s Payments API to enable customers to top up and access funds instantly, in real- time, without having to enter card details or share their bank credentials. With the payment, funds are transferred directly between bank accounts rather than through a separate payment network, which minimises cost and processing times. Payment authorisation takes place directly with the bank, making the entire process extremely secure.

“

Delivering a seamless experience to our UK retail and business customers is hugely important for us. When our customers say it’s easy to connect accounts using TrueLayer, that’s a huge tick for us.

Joshua Fernandes

Open Banking Product Owner

The results

Today, Revolut uses TrueLayer to enable customers to instantly link external bank accounts to the app, and to facilitate top ups and transfers between accounts.

When deciding which provider to work with on its open banking launch, Revolut chose to work with TrueLayer because of its scalability and superior developer experience. The process to get up and running and start experimenting with TrueLayer was quick and painless and the Revolut team found the TrueLayer platform to be robust and developer-friendly.