Chat-based personal finance assistant
Access your banking data in seconds — directly from your messaging app.
Turn Telegram (or any chat platform) into your personal banking assistant using Investec APIs. Check balances, review spending, and get instant financial insights — without opening your banking app.
The Challenge
Even with powerful digital banking tools, everyday financial questions still require effort:
- How much did I spend this month?
- What was my biggest transaction last week?
- What's my current available balance?
Answering these usually means navigating multiple screens, applying filters, and manually reviewing transactions. For quick decision-making, that's friction.
The Solution
Build a lightweight, chat-based assistant powered by Investec APIs. By connecting your Investec account to a messaging platform like Telegram, you can:
All through simple chat commands.
How It Works
1. Secure Authentication
Use Investec's OAuth authentication to securely authorise your application to access your account data. This ensures:
- Secure token-based access
- Controlled permissions
- Revocable integration at any time
2. Fetch Account & Transaction Data
Using Investec APIs, your assistant can retrieve:
- Account balances
- Recent transactions
- Card spend data
- Historical transaction ranges
This raw data becomes the foundation for answering user queries.
3. Interpret Chat Commands
The messaging app acts as your front-end interface. Examples:
- “Balance” → Returns available balance
- “Spend this month” → Calculates total outgoing transactions
- “Largest transaction this week” → Identifies maximum debit value
- “Show subscriptions” → Filters recurring merchants
You can predefine structured menu options or allow free-text interpretation.
4. Apply Logic & Calculations
Business logic can be handled in multiple ways:
- A lightweight backend service
- A no-code/low-code rules engine
- Spreadsheet-based logic
- An AI interpretation layer for flexible queries
This makes it accessible even for non-advanced developers.
Example Use Cases
Daily Balance Check
Receive your balance every morning at 07:00 via Telegram.
Weekly Spend Summary
Automatically calculate total spend and category breakdown every Friday.
Large Transaction Alerts
Send yourself a message if a transaction exceeds a predefined threshold.
Subscription Monitoring
Identify recurring payments and summarise them monthly.
The Impact
Faster Financial Decisions
No app navigation. No filtering. Just instant answers.
Better Financial Habits
Frequent, low-friction check-ins improve awareness and budgeting.
Fully Personalised Banking Experience
Build exactly what you need — from simple summaries to advanced analytics.
