What integration options are available and which should you choose?
Building your open banking payment experience is not simply about finding a provider that offers the right coverage for the right products and features.
It’s also about finding one that can work with your available development time and expertise, as well as working with your existing tech stack.
The integration process — by which we mean the process of turning your proposed payment experience into a working system that your customers can use — should be quick, match what was promised during the sales process and result in a high-converting payment option that your customers actively choose.
Ways to integrate your new payment experience
There are several ways to connect your new open banking provider to your business. The most common way is with an API. This could be a direct integration or via a partner — like a payment service provider (PSP) — that already powers your existing payment methods. The API could be delivered via a software developer kit (SDK) or hosted payment pages (HPP) depending on what you want your payment experience to look like and how much developer resource you have available.
The route to integration can seem daunting, but a good provider is there to guide you through this decision-making process and give you advice on what type of integration will help you deliver your intended use case on time. For example, direct API integrations allow customers to have a fully customisable payments flow, but it requires more time and technical expertise to set up. On the other hand, integration tools such as HPPs, SDKs and client libraries are slightly less customisable, but all make the integration process much smoother and easier for developers.
Self-serve style options do exist — where you are essentially given access to raw open banking data — but for most businesses, the lack of guidance creates ambiguity and obstacles.
Ask your provider
What’s the best way to integrate your solution, taking into account my available developer resources?
How long should the integration process take?
Any integration process involves actions from both your provider and your business, so a delay from your side — be it lack of developer resource, other priorities, etc — will add to the time it takes. But a good direct integration, where both sides are able to focus on the process and have agreed on the deliverables, should take around six weeks from kick off to go live. On top of that, using SDKs and HPPs could save an additional one or two weeks of integration time.
Consider the pain points that have led you to choosing an open banking payment provider. If you think the results of adding a new payment method will result in significant savings or will improve conversion, then finding a provider who can help you integrate swiftly should be a top priority.
Ask your provider
How long does a typical integration for my use case take from start to finish?
Clear stakeholders and deliverables
A provider will often assign an integration specialist to help build your integration. They may be called Integration Support, Integration Sales or Solutions Engineering, but their job will be to guide you through the process, as well as build and execute an integration timeline.
A good integration project will include a full list of stakeholders, deliverables and milestones. This process will typically begin during the sales process, so there’s no delay in launching your open banking experience if you commit to that provider. You should be left with no questions over which tasks should be done by which party, and in what order they need to be completed.
Ask your provider
Can you supply a template or example of a typical integration process?
Advice and best practice
As well as being a conduit for your needs and requirements, best-in-class integration support will give expert advice on how to make your new payment experience as effective and efficient as possible (see Payer experience). An established provider will have carried out hundreds of integrations, learning what works well and what doesn’t for different use cases, industries and business models.
One common objective for any new payment experience is to maximise conversion rates, meaning the percentage of customers who complete a payment journey once started. Your integration team should be able to advise you on how to build a payment flow that increases conversion.
Ask your provider
What UX/UI recommendations would you make for a use case like mine?
TrueLayer will assign an integration expert to your business, and you will typically have two-to-three meetings with them during the sales process so they can design your ideal integration. They will provide you with best-practice integration advice and support throughout the process, including:
Guiding you through which type of integration is right for your use case, taking into account your end-goal, plus the level of technical resources you have available.
Mapping out the integration process, from both a user’s point of view and a back-end technical perspective.
Delivering UX guidance to support you in delivering the best payer experience to boost conversion and share of checkout rates (see Payer experience).
Creating and running check-ins with you throughout the integration phase to drive the integration forward on schedule and help with any technical issues.
Working with your customer success manager and other post-integration stakeholders to create and prioritise feature requests (see Ongoing support).
“Overall, we had a great experience integrating with TrueLayer. They had good developer docs and Zendesk support, and their developer console was easy to use.
Harry Wynn-Williams,
Senior Software Engineer
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