Learn about the latest FS trends and news, from industry experts.

Financial services should be designing products and services that help buyers understand all of the costs involved in their end-to-end financial journey before committing.

For the past decade, the banking industry has been focused on developing frictionless interfaces. Financial institutions have prioritised seamless transactions, instant gratification, and engaging gamified features in a bid to build the ultimate digital financial experience.

The need for better, tailored support through the customer experience is clear, but few are accounting for the fundamental shift that financial services has experienced with the introduction of AI.

“It’s clear they’re not slowing down in transforming the financial landscape.” Those were the words of Jacqueline Dewey, CEO of Smart Money People, speaking about 11:FS after we claimed our fifth...

The UK’s largest digital bank once again beat RBS and NatWest to the top spot in 11:FS Pulse's best of UK banking chart.

As the Saudi fintech market matures, a new challenge is emerging. Most fintech interactions, whether payments, BNPL, or other services, remain fundamentally transactional.

When a customer reaches checkout today, they may get a choice to pay now, split the cost, or move it into credit. That is a very different starting point from the old model of applying for credit in advance.

Loyalty is defined as “a strong feeling of support or allegiance”. However, in the context of financial services, it is more accurately defined as engineered persistence: a series of subconscious cues that steer customers toward familiar choices.

For years, banks have relied on OTPs as a second factor for logins and sensitive actions. Sent via SMS, these short codes were designed to add security on top of a password. But they have become one of the weakest and most frustrating parts of the banking experience.

The people using business banking tools don’t necessarily have financial backgrounds. Many smaller businesses can't afford a dedicated finance team. Yet banks keep building products that assume expertise their customers don't have, leaving them to figure things out on their own.

As our financial lives become more complex, there is a growing expectation for banks to offer more support, be more relevant, and generate greater everyday value. One of the clearest places this shift is starting to show up is in subscription banking.

The UK is currently facing a rare opportunity in the world of payments. After years of debate about the future of the country’s payments ecosystem, government and regulators are now moving from discussion to delivery, with work underway to implement the National Payments Vision for world-leading payments delivered on next-generation technology.


Around the world, people have instant, around-the-clock access to banking apps and their own financial data. So why do so many people still feel uncertain about their financial future?