EQ Bank, powered by Equitable Bank, Canada’s Challenger Bank, has teamed up with Flinks, a key player in open banking, to provide EQ Bank customers with the ability “to share their financial data securely with third-party fintech applications of their choosing.”
This partnership, and the integration of Flinks Outbound, an Open Banking environment, provides EQ Bank with the framework “to quickly deliver flexible open banking capabilities and easily launch and operate new API data sharing methods while providing the bank with critical new data management capabilities.”
EQ customers who provide explicit consent “will have the visibility into what data are they sharing, with whom and for how long.”
With Canada’s fast growing network of fintechs apps, Flinks “enables easy adoption of these APIs by managing the onboarding, accreditation, and support.”
Andrew Moor, President and CEO of Equitable Bank, said:
“This announcement marks an important milestone in the evolution of the long partnership between Flinks and EQ Bank. Our two companies have long been philosophically aligned in believing that open banking can bring broad benefits to Canadian society. We work closely together to engage with government and industry groups to try to bring open banking to life in Canada and are delighted to deliver against that priority and bring innovative services to our customers to give them more control over their financial lives and their data.”
Cathy Ly, Vice President, Customer Experience, Digital Banking for Equitable Bank, remarked:
“Many of our customers have been asking for more seamless ways to share data with their other financial apps and we’re excited to be able to act on their feedback through this partnership with Flinks. Just as important, however, are those customers who have not asked about data sharing because they are unaware of the benefits that can come from it. We’re looking forward to reinventing how customers engage with EQ Bank and their financial data through open banking.”
Frederick Lavoie, Flinks’ Chief Operating Officer, added:
“Fintech adoption is here to stay and the winning banks are the ones who can focus on ways to create value for their mutual customers and embrace it. We’re thrilled to see Equitable leading the way in taking action to make open banking happen,”
As noted in the update, EQ Bank, the digital banking platform launched in 2016 by Equitable Bank (a federally regulated Schedule I bank), “provides state-of-the-art digital banking services.”
The Savings Plus Account “reimagines banking by offering an everyday high interest rate, plus the flexibility of a chequing account, with free transactions, no everyday banking fees, no minimum balances, fast, cheap, and fully transparent international money transfers, and more—all from one account.”
Its Guaranteed Investment Certificates (GICs) also “offer Canadians a wide range of options with competitive rates.”
