Following the announcement of its overall Financial Wellness Ratings, Benefits Guru has published a further set of ratings exploring in detail provider functionality around Open Finance.
The firm said open banking has rapidly grown in popularity, with more than three million consumers now using open banking-enabled products. Despite this, only 6 of the 11 companies Benefits Guru benchmarked currently use open banking technologies as part of their proposition.
This year, Intelliflo, Mercer Master Trust, Scottish Widows, Standard Life and True Potential have been joined by Aviva, who launched its new open finance initiative this week.
Providers were analysed across six core factors including:
account connectivity;
bank connectivity;
transaction history and categorisation functionality;
use of messaging to drive better member outcomes;
the ability to include partner and joint accounts; and
how they address member consent.
Aviva, Intellifo, Mercer Master Trust and Standard Life were all awarded gold, while Scottish Widows and True Potential received silver.
Ian McKenna, founder and director of Benefits Guru, said: “At a time when the cost-of-living crisis is undermining consumer confidence to a degree not seen in a generation, there has never been a better time to harness the power of data available from Open Finance to help consumers better understand their budgets.
“The impact of financial stress at work has been repeatedly demonstrated to be a significant hidden cost for employers, due to the lost productivity of staff who are worried about their finances. Some studies suggest this could be as high as 6% of payroll. As more and more insurers are concerned about the impact on premium income once the crisis really bites in October, as heating is turned back on, the smart companies are the ones deploying Open Finance techniques to provide individuals with greater financial resilience.”
[Main image: andrej-lisakov-g3z-CgUiPtg-unsplash]
