How FinTechs Enable Payment Data Visualizations

FinTech innovators are continually evolving their technology platforms as they aim to dive deeper into the automation space and also widen their offerings. DadeSystems, in one case, has been expanding into analytics. It considered building its own analytics, but it decided to use an open-source toolset that is Elasticsearch and Kibana. Elasticsearch is an open-source data store “that you can put tons and tons of data in” and it’s very robust, DadeSystems CTO and Co-Founder Doug Hathaway told PYMNTS in an interview.

Kibana, on the other hand, is the data visualization tool that’s built on top of Elasticsearch. One can think of Elasticsearch as a database and Kibana as the tool where one can create beautiful visualizations on the data. The goal for Kibana is that it lets the FinTech build these visualizations and but the FinTech can also give higher-tier customers access to a dashboard where they can create their own visualizations. And, while the FinTech put its own flavor on top of Kibana and white-labeled the technology a bit, Hathaway says the company isn’t hiding the fact that the program is, in fact, Kibana.

The company is vocal that the program is Kibana because if users have experience with Kibana, they can easily use the tool. The uniqueness of the FinTech’s value proposition, however, is that Hathaway says it has “a rich ecosystem of data on our end” about the payments. As payments arrive, the FinTech automates them and applies them to the appropriate receivables. Through that process, the company knows how and when customers pay as well as for what they are paying. The FinTech puts all of that information into its analytics engine, and it can provide visualizations directly to the corporate to help them see trends.

Those trends could include where they are receiving payments as well as patterns. It could help them see if checks are trending down or are Automated Clearing House (ACH) transactions trending up. And, for its bank customers, the FinTech helps them look at trends over all of their customer base. If they have dozens or hundreds of billers and clients using the platform, they can have visualizations rolled up at the bank level. With this information, banks can see what’s going on with payments, where they are coming from, and trends.

Through data visualizations, FinTechs are aiming to help corporate clients, as well as the banks that serve them, spot payment trends with the help of open-source technology.