️ What's new?

Updated React Native SDK

We updated our SDK to support the react-native-okra-webview package for both React Native and React Native Expo projects.  The Okra webview wrapper has been changed from OkraView to Okra.  Some minor updates to the UI include an improved modal behavior when the widget is closed and improvements on the loading spinner. To get started with the react-native SDK, check out the docs.

Transactions

We recently overhauled how we’re handling transactions from GT Bank mobile, First Bank mobile, Access Bank, Wema and FCMB. There are no changes in how you would use transactions, but this change has resulted in a 25%+ improvement on the success rate.

Quick payments

We launched a simplified widget experience for payments to minimize the number of steps the user has to go through to make a payment.  With this configuration, returning users will not have to go through the entire widget flow anymore, they simply go through a verification or MFA screen before instantly processing the transaction.

Open widget to a specific bank

We streamlined the widget flow for use cases where you already know which bank account the end-user has and want to send them directly to that bank login on the widget rather than letting them choose from the list of banks.  This direct-to-bank behavior will save the user some screens and ensure they connect to the intended account.

Fixes and Improvements

Banks

• Added a bank statuses endpoint so you can confirm bank status prior to making a call.

• Fixed a First Bank connection issue that was causing a “Maximum attempts” error to show on the first attempt.

• Improved Suntrust bank availability.

• Fixed an invalid credentials error on Union Bank of Nigeria.

• Removed a technical error from Zenith bank business accounts.

• Zenith mobile app optimizations.

• Refactored Access Bank web authentication for web banking.

Product

• We created an endpoint to enable canceling a payment before the request is sent to the bank. If the payment is completed already when a client tries to cancel it, the endpoint will trigger a refund instead.

• Improved results for income on accounts with limited transactions.

• Improvements on callback endpoint to get balance.  Removing the ‘null’ errors.

• Refactor all image and file uploads.

• Added link IDs to reports so you can differentiate and have better visibility for tracking.

• Refactored TIN and RC verification.

ICYMI

Businesses can use Okra Balance to retrieve the real-time balance of their customers' accounts to build relevant products and services.

Connectivity to raw data alone does not present much value, except when it is cleaned up and organized. Okra Transactions helps businesses retrieve meaningful information from their users' financial data to build great products.

Deepak Mali shares why he chose to work with Okra after building great products at Finicity (A Mastercard Company) and Reliance Jio.

Okra allows you to control the financial information you provide to banks and fintechs with My Okra. Here's how it works.

We are hiring!

Know somebody that could be interested in joining our team?  Current openings include:

• Customer Engineer (Technical)

• Data Scientist (Machine Learning Engineer)

• Engineering Manager, Data Infrastructure

• Financial Analyst

• Platform Engineer (Android)

• Sr. DevOps Engineer

• Sr. Frontend Engineer

• Sr. Technical Recruiter

• Team Lead - Payments, Data Infrastructure

Apply to all of our job posts on our site.

The Okra Team.