How 2020-2021 pandemic has shaped the test automation landscape?

The world had come to an abrupt halt with the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, but there was a sudden surge of innovation. Organizations in various sectors realized that to deal with the adversities of this crisis, they must innovate new ways to sustain their business. We adopted various digital platforms to interact and grow with the exchange of services and offerings. But ensuring the quality of these products, services and offerings remained a decisive point. 

We are all aware of the importance of testing. It is known to all that testing plays a vital role in ensuring system quality. Organizations are extremely vocal about the incompleteness of quality assurance without appropriate and adequate testing practices, structure, tools, and plans. Did the testing process come to an abrupt halt due to the outbreak of the Pandemic? No, it did not. In fact, organizations found different channels to facilitate the testing projects. As the old saying goes, “necessity is the mother of inventions”. 2020-2021 pandemic became a driving force to innovate for quality assurance.

Pandemic surely had some negative and positive impacts on digital transformation. But that did not refrain people from trying out new solutions and remedies to their problems. Let us look at some of the positive and negative impacts of digital transformation that organizations had to face during the global pandemic.

Positive impact of Covid-19 in digital transformation

There has been a tremendous change in the way people work, think, and act. They have learnt new techniques and how to put them to use. The digital transformation has made people adapt to the changes. They have learnt to think out of the box and try new technologies. Digital transformation has facilitated remote working, and employees know that they can still be productive and efficient even while working remotely. The new work structure is like, “give us the facilities and new technologies, and we will innovate from there”.

Negative impact of Covid-19 on digital transformation

What seemed like a positive development for some were unfavorable for others. Covid-19 came with certain restrictions on communication and physical interaction. Some of the organizations that followed an old school method could not evolve with the surrounding changes leading to the disintegration of their foundation. Many physical branches were closed down with the decrease in footfall, and their business moved to the virtual platform. It has become a strenuous task for the management team to bring their employees back to the office. Employees have learnt new ways of working it has become hard to drag their feet back to the office.

Testing before Pandemic

Software testing is an integral part of quality assurance, and organizations cannot put them on the back burner. Testing has come to the mainstream and is executed simultaneously with the development lifecycle. Organizations realized the importance of testing long before the outbreak of Covid-19 hence, continuous testing is included in CI/CD pipeline as an inseparable process. With the introduction of effective test automation tools, it has become easy and convenient to conduct and execute testing practices like regression, UI/UX functionality, integration, user acceptance and more at a massive scale. But there are more test requirements, which need expert and skilled testers to execute them. It is one reason that even after innovating the most effective test automation tools, organizations still require manual testing. Hence, we have the best of both worlds and automation test practice is most efficiently supported by manual testing.

Testing before the pandemic was mostly conducted onsite, with a significant portion handled by the offshore team. The organization had the advantages of system architecture and an adequate bandwidth with an efficient technical team deployed onsite that helped them carry out the end-to-end testing process without any disruption. After checking the end-to-end testing process and the product release, it would not have made much difference for the technical team to be on the testing site. However, the maintenance of the software performance and quality assurance was largely done by the offshore team.

Testing during Pandemic

The testing team still maintained the right blend of manual and automation testing. But a few things changed during the pandemic due to certain factors. There were sudden restrictions on travel and human contact. People were working from home and remotely, and international travel came to an abrupt halt. The testing process, however, could not have stopped. Organizations realized that it is only wise to adopt remote or offshore testing as an option. As test automation is more improvised and integrated with high-end technologies, remote and offshore testing would be as productive as onsite testing.

The remote testing model proved to be extremely convenient as the organizations could save a significant operational cost while the testing team handled the technical challenges and adversities. The technical team overcame many challenges like time zone differences, travel restrictions, and time constraints, ensuring 100% success in handling the end-to-end testing project from offshore. The team paid extra effort to deliver the project with utmost competence and assurance that all the testing aspects were considered and that all errors were addressed well without fail. Organizations are more confident that quality project delivery is possible even with challenges amidst the crisis.

Testing after Pandemic

Organizations are more prepared to deal with crisis and keep their business as usual (BAU) functional. It is no longer about choosing a testing project model. They have two models and multiple testing strategies based on their specific project requirements. Automation and manual testing go hand-in-hand and are applicable for many testing projects. The testing of banking or financial applications is exceptionally vital. Hence, it is necessary to have the most updated test automation tool to combine with the right test strategies, planning, and practice.

Organizations would not forsake either offshore or onsite testing models. Instead, both the testing model would act as a support to each other. Applying offshore testing proved to be a winning game for many organizations, as they succeeded in implementing the testing project and reap the benefits of offshore testing. Organizations have saved time and costs by adopting offshore test project models. Onsite testing is advisable when organizations have the in-house digital testing architecture to carry out the testing project. It is critical to have a compatible set-up of in-house architecture for the onsite testing model.

Conclusion –

After years of flourishing by offering onsite and offshore testing models to many organizations, Yethi has successfully delivered and completed 9+ offshore testing projects globally during pandemic 2020-2021. We are a niche QA services provider and have years of experience in delivering onsite & offshore testing projects. Having expertise in offering end-to-end testing services across all the major core banking applications with functional areas like Liabilities, Payments, Assets, Trade finance, Treasury and more, we have worked with 90+ clients across 22+ countries. We have not let our clients suffer from this unprecedented global situation and provided complete support to help banks avoid any business disruption and be prepared for any potential impact.

Our offshore testing model is designed considering all aspects like project knowledge, time constraint, travel restrictions, time zone differences and more. Our onsite and offshore testing models are managed by expert consultants and supervisors and backed by highly skilled resources and maestros in testing and programming to ensure that the testing projects are efficient and cost-effective.

Our highly experienced testing & digital consultants understand the processes and technologies involved in digital projects & quickly scale capacity to meet the needs of your business. Our dedicated offshore and onsite team can continue the workload with proper coordination, creating a continuous testing cycle.

We address the challenges of business continuity through our efficient testing models. Our 5th generation robotic codeless test automation tool Tenjin is built with intuitive features and supports our QA services. It is a fast and scalable test automation platform and works flawlessly across multiple applications to provide accurate test results.

Rising Customer Risks in Digital Lending, how efficient test automation can help?

The traditional lending process was time-consuming as the time for credit appraisal and disbursal used to be around three to four weeks, and the average time for account/money processing used to be approximately 60 – 70 days. In the traditional lending process, customers have complained that due to 30 days of the moratorium, the EMI would have started way ahead of the lending amount credited in their account. Often, customers used to opt for 6o days of the moratorium to avoid the inconvenience.

Soon organizations realized the need for digitalization to reform the lending process. Leading banks worldwide adopted digital lending to slash down the processing time to 24-hours. Digitalization brought a transformative change to the entire lending process. There has been a significant shift in end-to-end credit journeys, including the customer experience. Digital transformation has supported the credit processes. Digital transformation has improved revenue growth and achieved significant cost savings.

Digital lending allows customers to submit loan applications online. From applications, to documentation, verification and amount credited to your bank account, the entire process is carried out on mobile applications, and it takes less than a day to credit the principal amount to the customer’s bank account. From three weeks and 60-days, the time to cash is now reduced to 24-hours.

Rising customer risk in digital lending

Banks are enhancing the process by adopting paperless loan approval. They are automating the entire process to improve time and quality. But digital advancement has its own limitations. There is a rising concern for customer risk associated with digital lending. Customers share account details, personal information, credit history, and more on these applications. Hence, organizations must ensure that they maintain the stability, security, performance, and accessibility of these platforms.

The organizations are currently digitizing the credit and lending process. The banks are focusing more on improving customer experience by reducing the time taken for lending process. While organizations reduce the lending time, there is a major concern arising from customer risk. Let us look into the types of customer risks associated with the digital lending process.

  1. Multi-layered transaction process – The digital lending transacti0n is multi-layered as various lending services are outsourced to different entities. Multiple Fintech companies operate behind the operation to create a platform for transactions. As the customer uses these tech platforms for transactions, it becomes increasingly complicated in the cases of grievance redressal, like who will address the customer complaints, what actions should be taken and by whom to ensure that the services are more effective.

The platforms are integrated by embedded finance that forms a layer of services by different fintech modules. These platforms also work based on an algorithm that matches borrowers to lenders. While this algorithm creates efficiencies because several activities are performed simultaneously in a broader lending spectrum by outsourcing it to many Fintechs, there can also be certain drawbacks. If the borrower has appointed a defaulter as a guarantee, Fintech will address the loss. However, at the time of collection, customers will face many challenges.

  • Irregularity in information during loan origination process – The terms and conditions in the lending process are lengthy. The lending process becomes complex because not all organizations will have similar terms and conditions; some will have more than others. It increases the customer risk because customers may not have thorough knowledge and understanding of the repayment terms while signing the loan agreement. The customers may not comprehend the information like the interest rate, processing fees, overdue charges, annual percentage rate and more if not informed by the lenders. They would also not know the consequences of repayment delay, credit score impact, and implications of NPA.

Customers are also not aware of the payment recovery actions that organizations adopt. All this inadequate information makes borrowers make uninformed choices and affect their credit ratings. The loan disbursal is quick in digital lending, but without adequate information about the charges and consequences of non-repayment, the risk will increase.

  • Effects on unfavourable credit history – The previous point brings me to the current one that if the customers are not informed about the adversities of repayment delay or repayment overdue for months, it will affect their credit records. Most customers are not even aware that non-repayment or delays can affect their credit eligibility for future loans. Once the credit score is evaluated low, the customers must take multiple measures to rectify them or obtain credit approval to avail future loans. A low credit profile can lower the credit records making it difficult to apply for a new loan.
  • Lack of communication and transparency on assessment of creditworthiness – Digital lending, unlike the traditional lending process, which follows a thorough process of evaluation of customers’ credit profiles, does not engage in interaction with the customers, which is a requirement to analyse the customers’ creditworthiness. Digital lenders spend a lot of time on automated IVR, text messages, and social media advertisements to create awareness and push their services. Borrowers are not even aware of how the lenders have procured their contact details and credit history. It is not even clear how the lenders have evaluated the credit eligibility of borrowers. It creates a lot of confusion regarding whether it is spam or a genuine approach.

Like traditional lending, digital lending also considers two important aspects of the lending process; the customer’s willingness to pay and the ability to pay. While the first intention is evaluated through the customer’s previous credit history, the second intention is evaluated by the customer’s salary credited in the bank account, debit and credit history, investments, liabilities, and more. While applying for a loan, the digital lenders request access to contact details saved on customers’ phones. The lenders use this alternate data model to cross-verify borrowers’ credibility and positive intentions.

  • Lack of suitable assessment device – It is easy to avail of loans digitally as the processing is quick. But there is a lack of borrowers’ credit worthiness assessment that complicates the entire lending process. Often lenders provide top-up loans based on the timely repayment by the borrowers without a suitable assessment. This added loan sometimes may not flow well with the borrowers, and they may end up in high overdue.

The overdue reason could be the high-interest rates imposed within a short loan tenure. Several instances in the past highlighted that customers ended up being loan defaulters, and organizations had to contact them and force them to repay the loans. The collection process in digital lending happens digitally (mostly auto-debit). If customers miss one EMI, it will lead to a serious outcome, and lenders might look for alternative ways to recover the loans. Both borrowers and lenders face harassment.

  • Lack of grievance redressal – Digital lending lacks promptness in addressing customer complaints. In fact, the grievance redressal is not as quick as the loan disbursal process in digital lending. It also lacks transparency for customers, which their trust in digital lending. The digital lending ecosystem evolves multiple service layers offered by many fintech, making the customer interaction complicated and confusing and finally leading to failed redress. For most lending fintech, the only option for redressal is either through an integrated chatbot or WhatsApp chat sessions, which have certain limitations and do not always suggest adequate information. All these increase the intensity of redressal issues, and customers face problems.
  • Risk of compromised personal data – The unique selling feature of digital lending is how they gain access to customers’ personal data and use these alternate data for customer onboarding and credit appraisal processes. But it can be equally detrimental if the data points are sourced from external data agencies. Sometimes the borrowers sign two agreements in case the digital lending happens through a third-party service provider. In the above kind of agreement, the first signed agreement would be between the borrower and the lending app, where the lending app would be entitled to a different entity.  This structure allows the third party to gain access to customer data to collect all necessary information. These sourced data can be misused without the knowledge of the customers.

Why testing is an important digital lending platform?

Let us consider a scenario; you enter all your details, and suddenly the application stops responding with a notification message for you to close the application. You have to turn off the application, unaware of whether the application has recorded the details you have already entered. Or, you upload your documents and click your image, but the image does not get saved. The digital lending platform might have to contact the customer to inform about the missing information and ask them to upload all details again. Customers relate to the digital lending platform because of its seamless functionalities, easy navigation, superior performance, and security. If any of these is compromised and has errors, customers would not think twice about discontinuing using the application.

As per a report in Statista, “Digital lending is one of the fastest-growing fintech segments in India and grew exponentially from nine billion U.S. dollars in 2012 to nearly 110 billion dollars in 2019. It is expected that the digital lending market would reach a value of around 350 billion dollars by 2023”. We can imagine the growth of digital lending in the upcoming years with a 13.5% CAGR. The projected data give us an idea that the number of the digital lending platform will increase, which implies that it would need rigorous testing to ensure that the platform is top-notch without any technical errors. Each Fintech must also ensure that no organization loses their business to their competitors due to technical glitches of applications.

Let us investigate how efficient testing can improve the digital lending experience.

  1. UI/UX and integration – Customers seek platforms that are easy to use and navigate. Testing can evaluate a clean UI design and integration point to ensure that the customers enjoy a seamless experience of the lending platform.
  2. Performance – It is a massive turn off for customers if the application stops responding or if there is a performance error. Performance testing can ensure that the digital platform eliminates the possibilities of performance issues in the lending application.
  3. Accessibility and functionality – Customers relate to applications with easy accessibility and functionalities. They will not prefer using an application filled with features and functionalities. It confuses customers with the click-boxes and fields that do not allow them to navigate through the window command. Functionality testing helps detangle the application so that customers can easily access the applications and ensure that the platform performs at an acceptable standard.
  4. Security – Security is an important aspect of a digital lending platform. Customers share data with an expectation that the platform will maintain customer data confidentiality. The digital lending platform must ensure that the security of borrowers’ details is not compromised. Security testing can ensure that digital lenders maintain data security under the proper protocol.
  5. Regression – Changes, modifications, and addition to the digital platform are extremely frequent. Each change implemented in the application can harm the entire application functionality if not validated properly. Regression testing ensures that the new features are integrated adequately and correctly without disrupting the previous application features and functionalities.

Conclusion – Test automation is an effective solution to scrutinize the workflow of digital lending systems workflows. It validates the end-to-end process and saves time and effort for each implementation. Digital lending platforms have a high degree of inter-connectedness, which requires repeated testing to minimize manual efforts and achieve optimal coverage.

At Yethi, constantly upgrade and update your LOS and digital lending platforms to make them flexible and agile. The major challenge in testing these systems includes usability, performance, security, UI/UX, and Configuration. With Yethi’s robotic, 5th generation codeless test automation solution, Tenjin and deep domain expertise, the experts address the above challenges. Our team help banks and financial institutions drive their testing operation and ensure that their customers achieve their business goals within the stipulated timeline. Our intuitive solution – Tenjin, reduces 60-70% testing turnaround time.

Testing the fastest growing Financial Management Systems

Financial transactions are a part of our daily lives. How we manage our assets, income, and expenses must all be recorded in a system. A business must see its present and future i.e., debit and credit accounting, to ensure that they are compliant with the industry’s accounting standards. It is the reason that every organization must have a financial management system to record the financial transactions and provide a genuine report whenever needed.

The least you would expect is not to leave your customers dissatisfied without a proper financial management system (FMS). FMS is software used by organizations to manage assets, income, and expenses. An FMS reduces accounting errors, maintains audit trails, and remains compliant with appropriate accounting standards.

A financial management system must have the following features to qualify as an appropriate system for every organization.

  • Maintaining the transparency of all payments and receivables
  • Calculating the asset depreciation over the time
  • Tracking the liabilities
  • Maintaining the data integrity and security
  • Updating the reports/records
  • Managing multiple bank accounts
  • Managing and repaying prepaid expenses
  • Reducing overall paper records and paperwork
  • Organizing income and expense statements and balance sheets
  • Maintaining the audit trail accuracy

Purpose of financial management systems

The purpose of the financial management system is to keep a complete record and help the organization determine how to acquire and distribute funds, make critical financial decisions, enhance profits, increase the company value, and maintain business stability. Financial management forms the core of every organization. The organizations use financial management systems to manage their income, expenses, and assets with the objectives of increasing profits and ensuring sustainability.

The responsibility of an effective financial management system is to improve the short- and long-term business performance. The software helps streamline invoice and bill collection, removing accounting errors, reducing record-keeping redundancy, and ensuring compliance with tax and accounting guidelines and regulations. FMS helps in quantifying budget planning and offering flexibility and scalability to accommodate change and growth.

As a part of growing financial management software, the software can also include features like supporting the creation of ad hoc reporting, month-end, quarterly, and year-end closing report generation capabilities.

Testing financial management systems

Financial management systems carry a massive responsibility of managing, tracking, and reporting financial decisions. Organizations cannot afford to go wrong with FMS. Organizations need support with strategic test designing, test planning, and test execution across the entire software development lifecycle.

The organization must consider different project stages to ensure maximum quality at different stages. There must be a thorough requirement analysis, followed by planning and scenario designs. In the test design phase, reviews are collected, the Internal Quality Audit Team (IQA) are leveraged, and the designed test cases are reviewed periodically by SMEs and domain knowledge experts. Test cases are built based on designs, followed by test executions. Ensuring quality is an essential requirement in a test execution phase. In this phase, detailed entry and exit criteria are evaluated, and defect status is reviewed periodically.

For extensive software such as financial management systems, it must undergo end-to-end testing to ensure the software quality.  A financial management system must be evaluated under different stages during the software testing lifecycle. These evaluation criteria include requirements assurance, integration assurance based on application suite and system landscape, functional assurance based on user acceptance, and non-functional assurance based on application performance and security. It is also important to automate test execution wherever applicable and conduct regression testing to eliminate redundant test cases.

Conclusion

At Yethi, we have successfully executed an FMS testing project for multiple clients with over 450+ branches and 300+ branches across the country. We have empowered many businesses with our proprietary 5th generation codeless test automation tool – “Tenjin”, and a repository of 850K+ test cases. Our clients have already reaped the benefits of the FMS integration testing solution with their existing Core Banking System model. We have successfully covered 4000+ test cases on different platforms.

Are open-source test automation tools reliable for banking systems?

Banks are steadily adopting open-source test automation tools. Let us explore why banks rely on open-source test automation tools. Banks in less than half a decade have witnessed growth in technology and digital advancement. Open-source test automation tools offer banks a competitive advantage to remain updated with technological development.

It helps banks in cost reductions, stability, easy accessibility, training testers, testing in-house developed applications, and more. Because of its benefits and advantages, open-source test automation tools have evolved as an industry standard and became a necessity for banks and financial industry. It allows people working and evaluating the framework in large groups to identify errors, flaws, and technical glitches with ease.

The current age banking systems

Banking systems in the current times see a greater digital acceleration. The banks and financial institutions confronted the most fastidious situation and came out unharmed. The banking system is healthier and stronger in handling adverse scenarios after dealing with a global pandemic. Banks and financial industry have seen significant growth in technologies in recent times. Banks now follow the latest open banking trend, and there is unrestricted growth globally.

As per a recent report in Statista, the number of open banking users worldwide is expected to grow at an average annual rate of nearly 50% between 2020 and 2024, with the European market being the largest. As the graph shows, in 2020, Europe counted approximately 12.2 million open banking users. This figure is expected to reach 63.8 million by 2024. As of 2020, 24.7 million individuals worldwide used open banking services, a number that is forecast to reach 132.2 million by 2024. This growth in technology requires steadfast system validation to ensure that banks continue to perform and innovate.

The benefits of open-source test automation tools

To substantiate the question, “are open-source test automation tools reliable for banking systems” I will state a few benefits of open-source test automation tools in this article. Let us go through the reasons one by one to understand why open-source test automation is reliable for banking systems.

  • Better support and collaboration – There are vast fields of information available on the internet that testers can consult to overcome obstacles. Open-source framework enriches online communities, which allow the team from different locations to interact and collaborate with each other via a centralized server. There is a constant flow of information transfer within the community without any downloads and uploads.
  • Cost-efficient – The open-source test automation platform has low licensing costs and minimal hardware needs. The testing components are easily reused and have greater scalability, making the task of managing the performance and load testing easy. Testers can adjust total cloud storage based on the testing requirements making it flexible for organizations to opt for a pricing plan. All mentioned above help reduce the cost of using an open-source test automation framework.
  • Prompt testing – Open-source tools hasten the test cycles making it much shorter than the cycles run with traditional tools. Setup and tool deployment are prompt without the need of installing. The productivity remains unaffected as test updates are tracked in real-time. It reduces the overall time to market making the organization to focus on the quality and deliverables.
  • Overall quality – Several users and developers come together to ensure the quality and security of the open-source platform. The team comprises multiple developers across the globe who are among the best in innovating, improving, and enhancing the quality of the open-source test automation platform so that the users get a high-quality test automation package.
  • Easy to customize – The open-source test automation software comes with a customizable option to suit the specific requirements of the testing department. The codes are easily editable and offer smooth functionality.
  • Virtualization – Virtualization reduces the cost by easily sharing resources and making the best use of their respective skills. Virtualization ensures that testing is more efficient and user-friendly.
  • No restrictions – Open-source test automation platforms allow the organization to work with skilled teams and individuals. Users can fast track the decision-making process with complete control of the execution process. As the highly competent users and developers form a global community, there is uninterrupted support without restrictions.

Open-source test automation tools reform the banking systems

The banking and financial industry is undergoing a massive shift with the appearance of agile and DevOps practices. The importance of software Quality Assurance has increased to ensure the reliability and stability of banking software. Banking systems must be updated with regulatory and functionality changes frequently. Testing the applications from the start will only increase the time to market.

To eliminate the delays, banks and financial institutions are embracing DevOps practices. They are speeding up frequent iteration by establishing CI/CD pipelines and releasing small segments of applications in batches. QA teams are enabling early testing by taking the shift-left approach. Organizations are adopting the DevOps methodology that combines the development and testing teams to focus on a result-oriented QA process. The development team works in a cohesive manner where the development teams create and run unit tests while the test teams validate these at the API and UI layers.

As application development adapts the cloud native technologies, they are built with service packages and deployed as microservices. Open-source test automation tools speed up the testing process of financial and banking applications while reducing cost, enhancing stability, and offering easy accessibility. Banking applications are now managed on cloud infrastructure through DevOps processes and continuous delivery workflows making it accessible, flexible, and scalable.

The teams can ensure high software stability as test automation helps to achieve a larger test coverage and higher level of regression testing. Teams are also focusing on preventing and predicting application performance issues as a result organizations are replacing performance testing techniques with performance engineering.

Different types of open-source testing tools

To test the different types of banking applications and interfaces, the organizations must select the testing tools. The selection of testing tools must be based upon the two functional or non-functional testing aspects. The areas included in functional testing are Web UI, mobile app UI, and API validation, whereas the non-functional test areas include performance, reliability, scalability, and accessibility. The following are the types of open-source test automation tools that can help us to validate the banking software.

  • BDD based test automation tools

Testers or business analysts can create test cases in uncomplicated text language using BDD or Behaviour Driven Development framework. This software development approach allows even non-technical team members to understand the project details.

  • API automation testing tools

Teams are adopting agile and DevOps methodologies and shift-left testing approach that shortens the release cycles. It is imperative to execute API testing as it bridges the differences between unit and GUI layer testing.

  • Mobile test automation tools

The open-source test automation framework can help to automate workflows for native, hybrid and web apps. Many tools offer cross-platform support and JIRA integration.  Mobile test automation tools can automate workflows of iOS, Android, and Windows apps and offer support for multiple programming languages like Java, Ruby, Python, PHP, JavaScript, and C#.

  • Performance testing tools

Performance testing tools are intended for load testing of web applications. Many such tools are open-source test automation tools offering load and performance testing for cloud-native applications, APIs and microservices. A few performance testing tools allow writing test cases in ES6 JavaScript, while other tools offer built-in support for HTTP/1.1, HTTP/2 and Web Socket protocols. Some open-source test automations tools can be introduced into automation pipelines in Jenkins, GitLab, Azure DevOps, CircleCI and other CI/CD tools for performance regression testing.

  • Reliability and stability testing tools

These open-source test automation tools offer services on the cloud for generating various kinds of failures, detecting abnormal conditions, and testing the ability to endure the adversities. The main goal of focus of reliability and stability testing tools are to keep the cloud applications safe, secure with high reliability and stability.

  • Accessibility testing tools

Open-source accessibility testing tools offer thorough application testing to ensure that even the people with disabilities or specially challenged, of all age groups and different races, can use the applications without any issues or disruption. However, application testing must remain compliant with accessibility standards like WCAG 2.1 level AA and AAA, Section 508, ADA and EN 301.

Conclusion

Banking in current times is evolving fast. If it must keep up with the pace of fast changing technology landscape, the banking QA software QA must be ready to adopt newer techniques and tool sets. Banking and financial applications are the most versatile. Each application has functionalities only specific to the requirements, hence, to maintain the quality of the applications it must follow the e2e testing process. This article highlights the different open-source test automation tools and how banks can rely on them for their software testing.

Is India’s digital lending market equipped to manage the QA risk for appropriate digital experience?

Technology has made Indian banking systems move from physical to digital platforms. Amidst the rising concern of the global pandemic, when the entire world moved within home confinement and physical touch and interaction was restricted, banking needed a massive transformation. Since banks and financial institutions started digital transformation journeys, banks have elevated to internet banking and digital means of payments, digital account opening, digital lending, wealth-tech, and invest-tech solutions. Banks have moved further and adapted neo-banking models and became ‘Banking-as-a-Service’ (BaaS) platform providers.

Like all other channels in banking, the lending market is highly influenced by digitalization. With deep penetration of internet facilities, growth of services available on the digital platform, advanced technologies, regulatory changes, and more have triggered the growth of digitalization. Customer expectations have increased as the demand for virtual banking has increased like never before. It becomes a priority for banks to meet customer needs without compromising on superior customer experience. With the rise of fintech, the growth of digital banking has become inevitable.

What is QA risk in lending?

With the digital expansion, lending companies are faced with challenges like unethical business practices, mis-selling, cybersecurity, and data privacy concerns. Maintaining Quality Assurance for financial applications is crucial because it ensures that customer details and money both are protected. By testing the financial applications, organizations can validate the regulatory and reliability of the applications. However, there are some potential QA risks in the lending market.

Some of the common risks in software testing and QA of financial applications are,

  • There is a lack of communication and interaction between the lender and the borrower. An inadequate regulatory framework for digital loans like consumer loans, instant loans, etc., makes the matter more grave. It may lead to delinquency and potential fraud, which require safeguarding mechanisms against fraud in the lending platforms. Possible interaction, adequate regulatory framework, and applicable verification are necessary to prevent undesirable outcomes. Organizations must formulate an apt quality framework to save valuable resources and meet deadlines.
  • There are frequent changes in applications that may arise due to customer requirements. The request for changes is so frequent that it leads to resource gaps or exhaustion. Organizations must ensure product quality while meeting the launch deadlines. It creates immense pressure on the team to manage the risk while handling the project deadlines.
  • Sometimes, a lack of prioritization may shift the focus to insignificant aspects. The situation can be more critical if there is a lack of monitoring mechanisms for lending service providers and digital lending applications. The team pays more attention to the insignificant features ignoring the primary ones. Hence, it is critical to prioritize the main functionality and product highlights and build a monitoring mechanism to define and monitor the core functionality.

From loan origination to collections, the lending lifecycle has become digital. To render lending services, banks are collaborating with several third parties like fintech, distributors, SaaS providers, thus exposing borrowers and lenders to new and heightened levels of risk.

Importance of QA in lending service for outstanding lending experience

The importance of QA increases to ensure that the customers have an outstanding digital lending experience. The innovative operating models and structures evolved around digital lending demand the need to evaluate the risks and protect the customers and lending organization data. QA in lending services is critical as it helps in monitoring the system performance and functionality to manage the risk.

The risk management frameworks of banks and NBFCs have started utilizing digital touchpoints for a proactive risk assessment of client profiles. Without an adequate QA service validating the connectivity and performance of the digital touchpoints will be an impossible task for an organization, thus increasing the probability of risks. It will also hinder the organization from insightful decision-making. QA prepares your systems to perform without errors in identifying potential anomalous transactions.

An adequate QA service helps organizations regulate and formulate better standards for cybersecurity, privacy, customer servicing, dispute management, system availability and performance, and fraud. RBI frequently changes its guidelines, which requires organizations to incorporate the changes in the systems. A good QA practice will help organizations validate the changes in the systems without an error and remain compliant with frequently changing RBI guidelines.

Also, with these RBI guidelines changes, the organizations must assess the systems’ worthiness of the apps. Validating the systems against cyber threats is a critical exercise that lenders must follow. An adequate QA practice in lending ensures that the system is perfectly sustainable, accessible, and reliable even with these changes. QA practices also see that the apps can adapt to the contractual terms and conditions, customer rights and awareness, dispute resolution, manage fraud, and more.

How to manage QA risk for appropriate Digital experience?

To address the QA risks associated with testing of financial applications, the QA testers intensely scrutinize the following key aspects of the financial applications.

  • Security – Ensuring application security is a pivotal exercise for lending institutions. The Cyber-criminal makes financial applications and data (customer and organization) centre a soft target. Cybercriminals can gain control over customer accounts and misuse the data. The QA team tests the platform security to ensure that the applications and the data are protected and secured from all possible data manipulation.
  • Reliability – Financial applications have the extreme responsibility of assessing, processing, and storing sensitive customer data. This exercise ensures the application reliability of how accurate the applications can process and store data. A good QA practice ensures that the financial applications have a high level of data availability. It also confirms that even if the application performance fails, the applications can still protect the data.
  • Performance – It is critical to evaluate the performance of financial applications concerning the transaction time and transaction frequency. The banking, trading, and lending applications process many transactions in a short time. The apps cannot delay the response as each transaction request is critical. Any delay in application response can impact business operations. QA services validate the application performance during high traffic and heavy transaction volume. It identifies the performance bottleneck and prepares the systems to perform without disruption.
  • Regulatory Compliance – Every organization must comply with all regulations and government guidelines. The financial institution must prepare the operation to adapt to the frequent changes in system regulations so that the organizations meet the requirements of regional or national governments or various international regulatory bodies. A good QA practice prevents system failure by meeting the system’s compliance against civil, financial, or even criminal consequences.

Is India equipped to manage the QA risk for appropriate digital experience in lending market?

India has witnessed extreme growth in innovation and technologies in the past couple of decades. The country has been so proactive in embracing the digital transformation that even in a grave situation like the global pandemic, Indian financial institutions could pull it through. Today technologies drive Indian banks and fintech NBFCs. India’s digital lending consists of services like unsecured loans to secured loans, personal loans to business loans to vehicle loans, and loans for individuals and MSMEs in various age groups and segments.

Since the Indian banks are steadily adapting to innovative digital approaches across all channels, the fintech NBFCs could have been far behind. They are adopting digital lending like all other channels. Banks and NBFCs have collaborated with the e-commerce firms to finance the products to the buyers and encourage the suppliers and businesses to do business without any disruptions. Financial institutions also partner with marketplaces, aggregators, wallet companies, payment facilitators, etc., to cater to digital sourcing models. Financial institutions are now leveraging advanced technology and partnering with various fintech to offer products like Buy Now Pay Later, a point-of-sale credit, and others.

There are several technologies like data analytics, alternate data models, and data-based underwriting models that financial institutions use to create a digital database and reduce turnaround time and operational costs. Financial institutions have partnered with account aggregators to decide on the credit eligibility of the customers. Technology allows companies to undertake income assessment, loan monitoring, KYC data assessment, and create a single view of the customer across their liabilities and assets by leveraging data from other financial sources. The process will allow the lenders to onboard new customers with ease.

Financial institutions also utilize emerging technologies like open banking or video KYC, which requires them to coordinate with fintech for an array of financial services like lead acquisition, KYC verification, income verification, e-signing and e-stamping, and processing fee payments and collections. The Reserve Bank of India has formed a Working Group on digital lending, which addresses the risk posed by digital evolution in financial services. This group also ensures that organizations reap the benefits of digital innovation.

If organizations encourage the covert digital or neo banks, digital-only NBFCs or banks, they must ensure that their QA is top-notch. Organizations are testing their systems and platform. Organizations have adopted an agile testing methodology to include QA practice early at the development stage to highlight the errors so that the team can identify and resolve those issues. Testing has become an integral part of the development stage. QA practice gives the banks and financial institutions that level of confidence and liberty to innovate and introduce new technologies without any restrictions. 

Conclusion

The growth of digital lending had a tremendous impact on organizational setup, technology, compliance, and operational costs for digital lenders. The entire structure of the financial organization is changed. Organizations use AI/ML-based underwriting algorithms to offer better monitoring and governance in the segment. Digital lending is building customer trust by providing more transparency providing a comprehensive framework and a progressive regulatory environment for the fast-growing digital lending segment.

Banks and NBFCs successfully offer robust and seamless digital lending infrastructure to existing and potential borrowers. They effectively address and mitigate issues concerning cybersecurity, data privacy, operational risk, third-party risk, and fraud risk. The financial institutions and their partners are reaping the benefits of digital innovation while mitigating potential QA risks to offer an outstanding digital experience to the borrowers.

Improving core banking implementation with a viable performance test approach

Banks and financial institutions are evolving to be more customer-friendly. They no longer need complicated applications & software, bulky systems, or multiple platforms to store customer and banks’ data, simply because it no longer serves the purpose. Hence, they opt for various core banking solutions, which help them bring all data onto a uniform platform and be more strategic and organized in maintaining the details.

Core banking implementation is a transformation journey for financial institutions. But 7 out of 10 banks go through many challenges during the different stages of the implementation project. These challenges include the non-functional aspects like stress, performance, or security penetration of the project. Let us look at the consequences of avoiding these mandatory checks. On a few specific days, banks may see a sudden spike in traffic; it can result in an extreme load on the system leading to performance failure.

In the past, several incidents were recorded where the customers were affected and disappointed with system performance failures. No banks can guarantee to function as usual with a massive surge in digital transaction volumes. Banks have realized the importance of testing the non-functional aspects of the systems, so today, it is an essential and integral part of any large-sized and mid-sized transformation project for banks.

We are a little far from realizing what performance testing means for a bank or financial institution. This article serves as a reference to improve core banking implementation with appropriate testing methodologies and a test automation approach. I will also explain why it is a critical exercise and cannot be cast aside until the last minute.

The important aspects of non-functional testing

A statistical report published in Gartner reveals that the average cost of IT downtime is around $5,600 per minute, which amounts to about $300,000 per hour on average. The calculation excludes regulatory penalties and reputational damage. This brings organizations to much deliberation about preventing downtime during production. The load testing helps an organization confirm that the systems are ready to take the usage load adequately to its capacity in the production stage.  

Knowing the objectives of performance testing

Performance testing measures the system behavior and response during peak activity hours. It ensures the consistency of the systems even with a high load. Performance testing also ensures that system performance does not deteriorate with time under average load and continuous usage. It determines the system sustainability, and if any performance bottleneck is detected or identified during testing, it must be reported and documented immediately. Performance testing also validates that the system and load is uniformly distributed across different product architectural layers. It also ensures that the system allows the access of multiple users at the same time and the system scalability to accommodate more users under the same sessions.

Performance testing scope

Performance testing becomes as essential process for a core banking implementation project and production lifecycle. It must cover all types of process activities including online transaction processing from systems interface and various channels, same day uploads, end of cycle batches, and data migration from legacy systems.

There are two methodologies for testing the core banking implementations, i.e., automated load testing and business simulation. In this article we will specifically talk about the first methodology.

Automated load testing

There are four phases of the automated load tests for performance testing.

  1. Designing phase

In the designing phase, the team gathers the requirements and studies them thoroughly to understand the scope and functionality of the application. They understand the performance requirements from a business viewpoint and analyze the matrix of business volume and historical data. The team finalizes the performance testing goals and objectives based on these requirements, finally measuring acceptable results. The automated load tests are designed, followed by an appropriate action plan.

  • Building phase

The channels and test scripts are prepared in batches for different business scenarios common to the user interface. The channels and batches test scripts are used to simulate load into the application tiers. An initial sanity check of the application is conducted after the data is migrated and uploaded onto the performance test platform. If there are remaining historical data to be created, they are injected into the system. During the build phase, the team configures the monitoring tools for gathering system performance metrics for the testing window.

  • Executing and diagnosing

The performance test is executed to validate environmental configurations and application performance behavior. Executing and diagnosing stage leads to an optimized environment for the final measurement run. Repeated performance testing is conducted to evaluate application performance behavior. There are three possible iterative stages which can be configured. And between each of these iterative stages, the team reinstates the performance testing, and the test is re-run again.

  1. Stage 1

The system behavior is recorded by executing the specific functions at the peak load. If any errors or flaws are noticed in environmental or application configurations, it is immediately reported to the respective stakeholders to upgrade and obtain maximum throughput.

  • Stage 2

In stage two, the system behavior is recorded along with the simulation of an integrated business scenario. Similar to stage one, if there are any errors or flaws in environmental or application configurations, they must be reported to respective stakeholders to upgrade and obtain maximum output.

  • Stage 3

The final round is a final round of simulation where all refinements / fine-tuning / fixes are updated from earlier test rounds and are validated. The load testing is executed at peak hours to ensure the resilience and stability of the system through volumes, endurance runs, and stress tests.

  • Measuring and evaluating

In the final measuring and evaluating phase the system metrics are captured and measured. The system testing is conducted to validate the metrics post-run. It is used to prepare the final performance test report.

Improving core banking implementation with Yethi’s testing services

At Yethi, we follow a strategic test objective. We capture non-functional requirements, set up a testing environment, script used cases, build scenarios, execute the test, and prepare PT documents based on reporting and analysis. We gather & analyze NFR, perform a feasibility study, and identify performance test tools. We set up server tier deployment, populate target database, populate target DB, external systems & licenses, and plan performance test strategy. We develop load test scripts, design load test scenarios, create test data, identify & build volume, soak, and stress scenarios. We determine and define the injector profile for injector deployment and timelines. We execute sanity, volume, isolation, stress, soak and load balancing tests.

When it comes to reporting and analyzing, we collect data samples, determine test outcomes by comparing expected performance, and maintain result reports and dashboards for all types of tests. We focus on the following,

  • Baseline Test – Measures the current performance metrics
  • Load Test – Create demand on a system and measure its response
  • Stress Test – Determine the stability of the system by testing beyond normal operational capacity
  • Soak Test – Run at high levels of load for prolonged periods.

Our performance test management is based on test execution and analysis and transaction capture and analysis. We capture and analyze transactions from applications under test (AUT) by pulling data from a web server, app server, and database server. And execute tests and analyses across various server systems through load injection and KPI monitoring. Our test management module focuses on creating and executing performance test scenarios and creating scenarios for different end-user activities against AUT.

We offer load injector and KPI monitoring as dedicated services to generate requests against AUT simulating concurrent virtual users, executing the specified use-cases. Through load injector and KPI monitoring, we collect performance metrics from all metrics collection agents and store them in the performance metrics repository. We collect load test results by Controller are stored in the result repository database. We execute performance testing for the application under test (AUT) and its components.

Handling Process Risk Categorization and Prioritization

Risk-based testing is a preferred approach for many industries. Especially in banking and financial industries, where the applications are updated and released at regular intervals, risk-based testing helps identify the risks to ensure system quality at the early stage of the project. Risk-based testing requires thorough test planning, preparation, and execution. One of the critical steps is to identify the risks through the different testing methods and categorize them accordingly. This article is a detailed study of different strategies and action plans for risk-based testing; and how to handle process risk categorization and prioritization.

Risk Prioritization

Prioritizing risks is crucial for creating a framework for allocating resources. The overall order of recognized risk events, their probability of occurrence, and their effect assessments are arranged in a risk prioritization analysis to create a most-to-least critical sequential order of identified risks.

For risk impact assessment and prioritization, a variety of qualitative and quantitative methodologies have been developed. The analysis of likelihood and impact, the building of a probability and impact matrix, risk categorization, and risk frequency rating are among the qualitative methodologies used (risks that have multiple impacts). The weighing of cardinal risk assessment of consequence, probability and timeframe, probability distributions, expected monetary value analysis, and modeling and simulation are examples of quantitative methodologies.

To use these strategies for identifying potential implications, defining inputs, and interpreting data, expert judgment is critical.

Risk Impact Assessment and Prioritization

Risk impact assessment is a procedure in which we assess the probabilities and consequences of possible risk events if they are found. The results of the assessments are helpful in prioritizing risks for establishing a ranking based on critical importance. This ranking of risks in terms of their critical importance is what determines the insights into the project’s management on how the resources would be needed to manage or to mitigate the realization of high probability and high consequence risk factors.

For some projects, the effects of the risk on organizational goals and tenets are more meaningful to the managing body. Risks must be dealt with against the potential negative effects on the organizational goals. The use of risk management tools for the organization and its components can help with the consistency of risk determination.

Law Of Diminishing Return

According to the law of diminishing return, a decreasing marginal output of production can be caused by an additional amount of a single factor of production. The law considers other factors to be constant.

Monitoring Risk: Risk Tracking and Risk Assessment

Most enterprises hold normal risk assessments on a regular schedule. Most often, these are annual occurrences, but it is ideal to monitor the ongoing risk mitigation and state of identified risks as a continuous activity.

We, as humans, monitor and react to risk constantly in our daily lives; therefore, one should deal with an organization’s risk mitigation in the same way. It’s a smart strategy to perform periodic risk reviews in advance. One should make time each month to review the highest probable and largest impact risk along with the mitigation strategy that allows for continuous improvement through risk tracking and risk management.

Risk Identification

Risk identification is the process of identifying risks that could prevent the enterprise or investment from achieving its goals. It includes documentation and communication of the concerns.

Program risk assessments, risk assessments for supporting an investment choice, examining an alternative, and assessing operational or cost uncertainty factors are only a few examples of risk assessments. To assist risk-informed decision-making, risk identification requires matching the type of assessment necessary.

The first step would be to identify the project goals and objectives, therefore developing a common understanding across the team of what is needed to complete the project successfully.

The goal of risk identification is to identify the events that may occur early in the process and may have negative effects on the ability of the project to achieve the required performance or capability for the outcome of the goals.

Risk Mitigation Planning, Implementation, and Progress Monitoring

Risk mitigation planning is the process in which options and actions are developed for enhancing opportunities and reducing threats to project objectives. And risk mitigation implementation is the process in which risk mitigation actions are executed. Risk mitigation progress monitoring consists of keeping track of the identified risks, identification of new risks, and evaluating the risk process and its effectiveness throughout the project.

The risk mitigation stage involves the development of mitigation plans designed for managing, eliminating, or reducing the risk to an acceptable level. Once a plan is implemented, it is constantly monitored to assess its effectiveness with the intent of revising the needed course of action.

Risk categorization in project management is the process of classifying risks based on their sources, areas of the impacted project, and other helpful categories for evaluating which parts of the project are most vulnerable to risks or uncertainties.

The common root of the causes is also used for risk categorization. This unusual project management technique aids in the identification of project work packages, phases, activities, and roles that may be used to construct an effective risk response strategy.

The basic goal of risk categorization is to avoid unpleasant setbacks.

It also results in a systematic and structured method for recognizing risks on a consistent basis. Another benefit is that it allows management to concentrate on recognizing a wide range of dangers. Conducting sessions with participants to work with a specific risk category is good for risk assessment.

Since diverse projects often involve distinct sources of risks and procedures, it’s impossible to define a one-size-fits-all risk category for all projects. Nonetheless, the project manager should construct the necessary number of categories for risk classification.

Test Coverage

Test coverage is defined as a metric that measures the amount of testing performed by a set of tests. It consists of gathering information about the parts of a program that are executed while running the test suite to analyze which branches of conditional statements have been taken. Simply put, it is a way of making sure that your tests are testing your system, or in other words, determining how much of your framework is effective by running the test.

What does test coverage do?

Text coverage performs the following functions:

  • It finds the area of the requirement not implemented by a set of test cases.
  • It helps in creating additional test cases to increase overall test coverage.
  • It identifies a quantitative measure of test coverage that works as an indirect method for quality check.
  • It identifies meaningless test cases that do not increase test coverage.

Yethi’s risk-based testing approach

Yethi follows a methodical risk-based testing approach by selecting test scenarios based on importance to customer & security, financial impact, the complexity of business logic, and integration points. We review business processes, business products, applications, and integration. We design test processes to bring high reusability and offer automated business process simulation for high-risk areas. 

We maintain a risk parameter based on our analysis of the business process, risk indexing and set of products. Our risk parameter consists of regulatory, financial impact, customer servicing, operations, and system risk classifying the risk levels into different categories based on the parameter. Finally, we prioritize the test cases based on risk parameters and risk level categories. We test banking and financial applications following a risk-based approach, which requires us to have expertise in handling risk categorization and prioritization.

Aspects You Might Pay Close Attention While Testing Trade finance

Managing international trade and commerce on a platform requires a thorough inspection. Companies use financial instruments and products to accelerate International trade and commerce. These instruments and products make it easy for banks to transact business between importers and exporters through trading.

Trade finance is a simple mechanism controlled by 3rd party, whether a bank or other financial institutions. Now consider an instance that while processing a “letter of credit” or “credit letter”, a bank faces a performance failure or functional errors during an ongoing trade transaction. It will have a terrible impact on the trading process, which will add to the risk for both buyer and seller, putting the 3rd party (bank or financial institution) in a bad light. As the main focus of trade finance is to eliminate the risk associated with the payment and supply, the 3rd issuing party (banks or financial institutions) must ensure that the transaction is carried out without any disruption. It leads to the need for testing the trade finance platform to ensure a seamless performance at all times. 

Why testing Trade Finance is necessary?

Mentioned below are the points, which explains why testing trade finance is necessary

  1. Reduces the payment risk – It acts as a security to reduce the payment risk for the exporters and supply risk for the importers.
  2. Ensures quality system performance – Banks and financial institutions have dedicated trade finance modules and systems to process diverse trade finance transactions. Testing the trade finance module is critical to ensure that the system runs smoothly and efficiently and provides accurate results.
  3. Improves the efficiency of operations – Testing the trade finance allows companies to record cash transaction between importer and exporter by reducing the system performance errors and improving the operation efficiency.
  4. Reduces the time to process the transactions – Testing the trade finance platforms ensures the system stability to accommodate multiple information and process the transaction in less time. It also ensures that the systems perform without any technical errors even with high volume of data and speed of transaction.

Key Points While Testing Trade Finance Modules

Following are the key points to keep in mind while testing the trade finance modules:

  1. Understanding the Product: Trade finance involves multiple products banks may use to extend the facility. Each product has different features and ways of providing finance. Therefore, it is important to understand the product and instruments. Here’s a brief description of instruments for trade finance:
    1. Letter of Credits: A Letter of Credit reduces the risk of non-payments. The buyer’s bank provides a payment guarantee to the seller’s bank by issuing a letter of credit. Financing can be availed of by the seller against this letter of credit as the seller’s bank has security that the buyer’s bank will pay in case of default by the buyer, thereby acting as a bank guarantee. The buyer’s bank can then proceed against the buyer to recover the dues.
    2. Cash Credits / Overdrafts: These are some of the most common means of raising finance whereby the businesses can borrow money from the line of open credit accounts for trade. One of the key benefits of this form of finance is that the interest is charged only on the amount utilised. Once the payment is received, it can be credited to the cash credit or overdraft account to reduce the amount of borrowing and consequent interest rate.
    3. Invoice Factoring or Invoice Discounting: Here, the seller can present the invoice to the bank to avail of finances. The bank or the concerned financial institution can either purchase the invoice, collect the remittance or discount the invoice where the bank itself does the bill collection. Either way, the seller gets the required financing to meet his working capital needs. Once the payment is received, the bank adjusts the amount against the factored-in or discounted invoice.
    4. Export Credits: Export credit allows the exporter to avail of pre-shipment financing. By presenting the export order received from the importer, the exporters can use the export credits. After receiving funds from the importer, the amount is adjusted against the export credit to close the same.
    5. Term Loans: Terms loans are specifically suited for long-term projects. Here, one can avail the required amount against certain security. The loan amount needs to be repaid in instalments during the loan tenure, which is usually 10 to 30 years. Term loans can be taken against the property or any other asset of the seller. In many cases, top-up facilities are also available if more funds are needed.

2. Impact Analysis: Certain changes are carried out in the systems to increase their efficiency and meet the needs of the changing times. The impact analysis helps analyse the impact of the changes carried out in the systems. This ensures that the changes are working as intended and there are no inaccuracies.

3. Application security: Financial data held by the banks and financial institutions are sensitive. Therefore, security cannot be compromised at any instance. This makes security testing an important aspect of trade finance modules. Therefore, as trade finance involves an international transaction, security testing ensures that the transactions are carried out in a secured manner.

4. Application performance: Trade finance involves a multitude of transactions. Therefore, it is important to determine the system’s performance to ensure that it caters to the requirements of each product and instrument.  Loopholes in the performance are identified and corrected to ensure the smooth running of the systems.

Why Yethi for trade finance testing?

Yethi has been one of the preferred QA service providers for banks, financial institutions, and insurance across the world. With expertise in the banking and financial domain, Yethi provides complete software testing solutions, especially when testing trade finance modules. It includes functional testing, non-functional testing as well as advisory services.

We have tested all the functionalities of the Modules and Submodules like Letters of Credit (Export LC & Import LC), Bank Guarantee (Inward BG & Outward BG), Bills [LC Bills (Import Collections & Export Collections) & Non-LC Bills (Import Collections & Export Collections)]. We have tested multiple Trade Finance applications like Oracle FLEXCUBE, Infosys Finacle, Intellect, and more; also covered Trade Finance products like Bill Collection, Letters of Credit, Bank Guarantee, Open Account for Trade, C2C Transactions for Trade, and B2C transactions for Trade

With its plug and play banking aware solution Tenjin, Yethi brings distinctive and intuitive features with robotic capabilities that can learn and re-learn the applications. This codeless test automation solution is easy to integrate with all banking and financial platforms and ensures holistic testing of systems and software in a quick and time-bound manner regardless of the complexities of the transactions and updates.

In a Nutshell

Whether it’s B2C transactions for trade or C2C transactions for trade, trade finance is important to secure the exporters and importers. Equally important is the functioning of the trade finance module in an accurate and hassle-efficient manner. Periodic testing of the modules ensures that there are no security threats, and the module satisfies the established quality thresholds.

10 Important Aspects to Consider While Testing Mobile Banking and Internet Banking Platforms

Testing mobile and internet banking platforms are essential in the current banking landscape. Customers no longer wish to continue with brick-and-mortar banking. They avoid visiting banks and standing in long queues as they know that the banks will meet their requirements even from a remote location. This daily dealing and transactions are now pushed to an extreme, where banking seems impossible without mobile platforms. Of course, inadequate performances of mobile banking have various consequences, and there is no room for pondering whether the mobile and internet banking platforms need testing. The answer to the question will always be a big “YES”.

Indian millennials totalling 440 million, compose 46% of the workforce and contribute 70% of the household income. An average millennial checks his smartphone once every 15 minutes. Digitisation has made it easier for millennials and other banking customers to access their banking accounts 24/7 without waiting in long queues. Mobile banking and internet banking have reduced the cost of banking and streamlined processes to deliver more value to customers. The key to gaining a competitive advantage is customer-centricity in banking applications.

Banking applications and software have complex structures which incorporate a wide range of features and ensure security to all its users, while ensuring a seamless and user-friendly experience. If a banking application is released full of bugs and errors with performance issues, it will damage the credibility of the bank. Banking has essentially become a multichannel provider, and a successful testing strategy is testing cloud, mobile, internet and other aspects of the banking applications to ensure proper performance.

Let’s look at the ten aspects that banking applications (mobile or internet banking) must consider while testing the platform

  • Total coverage of workflow and business requirements
  • The functional aspects of the application
  • The security aspect of the application
  • A fool proof disaster recovery programme to protect users from unfair practices
  • Data Integrity
  • User application, support service sectors and facilitate payments through multiple gateways
  • Integrate well with other apps, including billing apps, credit cards, and trading accounts
  • Fast processing of secured transactions
  • Increased storage capacity of banking apps
  • Be user-friendly, support users across all platforms and on all devices
  • High auditing capability to troubleshoot customer issues

Testing Internet banking platform and mobile banking platform for banking apps

While testing banking applications, one of the important issues to address is data complexity. Banking applications store all sorts of private information, data, passwords, and assets of the customer in the backend. The backend databases should not be affected by malware. Testing ensures that the data is protected. The bank should have an automation tool to check data connectivity continuously. Data connectivity testing is tested over a virtual private network continuously. This will ensure that the private data is safe. The following testing methods are recommended for internet banking and mobile banking platforms:


1) Privacy governance: The most common privacy governance model that is used in data protection is a decentralised model where different business owners within the organisation are responsible for data protection matters within the scope of Indian data protection laws and   requirements, stay compliant and being proactive in solving issues. They should have expert knowledge of the data protection law and its governance and the ability to fulfil the tasks set out in the regulation. There will be various areas such as legal, IT and others involved in this process.


2) Functional testing: The design and configuration of the banking apps have to be perfectly configured. In reality, many banking apps are designed and configured imperfectly.

The testers of the mobile and internet banking platform have to understand that all the modules and the system function as designed by developers while testing the app.


3) Performance Testing: Performance levels consist of infrastructure, backward integration, and connectivity. Performance failures plague both internet and mobile banking. There should be regular administrative oversight of transactions happening during regular interim periods. Load and stress tests should be regularly performed so that transactions have multiple supports at the same time. The performance of the banking app comes under pressure during festival times. User experience is affected when there is a performance failure of the banking app. It could be as simple as cyber/IT failure leading to incorrect balances showing in the customer accounts. This leads to mass panic. The banking app must obviate such potentialities.


4) Integration testing: Users use many different channels and internet connections, and testing should consider the fact that the performance of the banking app in different channels is uniform.  Banking apps should integrate with programs used by customers without difficulty and without creating hurdles and complexities. When different system modules interact on the customer’s mobile banking app, there will be bugs and errors, so the testing teams must be cautious about bugs and incompatibility impairing the performance. Some bugs are detected in the early stages of the software development life cycle. Bugs could be due to a broken database schema or a wrong cache integration. Integration testing is necessary to understand the variations in the developer’s logic against the software requirements. It is also necessary to validate the modules’ interaction with the third-party tools and Application Programming Interface. There is a multiplicity of mobile devices, used by the bank’s customers in the marketplace. The multitude of customer devices using different platforms and networks must be tested. As this is a complex process, the automation must be planned properly.


5) Accessibility testing: Users of mobile apps may suffer from various physical problems which include being partially sighted, being dyslexic, suffering colour blindness, movability issues relating to their fingers, suffering from arthritis or other issues like using a small screen. The mobile app should be user friendly as much as possible. Testing screen readers, analysing colour ratios, html validator, inbuilt accessibility options, WCAG 2.0 checkpoints, site readability and navigation will ensure better accessibility.


6) Usability , Usage and Acceptance testing:  Usability testing must bear in mind the needs and requirements of a different group of customers. The design of the banking app should therefore be simple. It should be tested among different groups of people as not all will have technical skills. The banking app should be user-friendly and easy enough to use so that even the luddite is able to use the banking app easily.
Acceptance testing ensures the mobile apps with their various features are accessible to the end-users and also for business needs. This type of testing could use a black box type of testing of end-users to make the app more user-friendly and accessible to end users.


7) Data Migration testing: This testing checks whether all data has migrated with integrity from the source platform to the destination platform. This is particularly necessary when data is migrated from legacy systems to the newer applications. Testing has to ensure the integrity of migrated data.


8) Security testing: Security testing is one of the most important aspects of testing the banking app. Banking apps are prone to fraud and phishing attacks. Vulnerability scanners and penetration testing can help in this process. Testing procedures must ensure that all international security standards are followed. The privacy governance in mobile banking apps is key as it interfaces with several other third-party applications. Trojan horses could be hidden in free games which can steal the user data. That is why several authentication factors are put in place before a customer can access his mobile banking app. The Operating system and network vary across various user mobile devices. Testing must adhere to all platform, network, and operating system security standards.

Mobiles are susceptible to theft and loss, malware, and malicious applications; there is also a lack of maturity in fraud tools and controls. There are also SMS, fraud, and operating system vulnerabilities. Testing should control these risks and ensure compliance with all security protocols.

9) Regression testing: Most banks are continuously innovating and adding new features to their banking apps. When mobile banking apps are modified, the changes can have unexpected consequences. Regression testing aims at making sure that no bugs or functionality impairments are caused due to such modifications. Regression testing is crucial for banking apps as they enable banking transactions and use the protected private data of customers. Therefore, regression testing of all updates to the mobile banking app is essential.


10) UI/UX testing: In this type of testing the testers must make sure how buttons, fields, toolbars, colours, fonts, and icons respond to the user input. Testers need to make sure that the mobile app, software, or platform responds perfectly to the end-user.

Key Takeaways

Testing mobile and internet banking platforms can be a complex and demanding process but experienced users can employ strategies that can help banks and their clients secure a vulnerability-free mobile app and a user-friendly interface. The mobile banking app and the internet banking app solution provided by the bank should be a secure, user-friendly app which is free of bugs and errors, where the user can navigate between various pages/screens with minimum difficulty and make a seamless 24/7 banking experience a true reality. The importance of the role of testers and other software specialists in transforming this dream into practical reality cannot be understated.

All you want to know about testing Finacle Wealth Management Systems

Wealth management is a support advisory service offered to the customer in effectively creating a long-term/lifetime investment plan. The advent of financial technology has been noticed in the Wealth Management also, as a result it has left an immense impact on the service. For the last several years, financial organizations are using multiple technologies like chatbots, artificial intelligence, blockchain, cryptocurrency, neo banks, Robo-advisors, and other digital solutions, to streamline the front-to-back-office operations and enhance the productivity of the advisors to offer outstanding services to the customers. 

Understanding the customer need of the hour, the financial services and solutions providers build a multi-module CRM platform that will not just provide the finest investment advice to the clients but will manage the end-to-end wealth management process. Finacle, being an industry leader, offers a comprehensive financial solution. Finacle’s Wealth Management Systems allows banks to provide new services and products in a time-bound manner besides the traditional banking services. Thus, many banks and financial institutions have opted for Finacle Wealth Management System as their trusted CRM platform to offer efficient services and strengthen their customer portfolios.

The Wealth Management Systems handle a series of workflows like defining financial goals, planning investment, creating & reviewing the portfolio, planning for estate & tax, planning assets strategically, family philanthropy, managing cash, managing & analyzing diversified investment plans, reporting, and more. As the systems are created to streamline all the processes, it requires end-to-end testing with a massive focus on handling risk and compliance and helps in reporting. As stakes are high in managing the portfolios of high-net-worth individuals and retail customers, any inaccuracy can lead to huge losses. Hence, testing the wealth management system becomes an inevitable step to ensuring system performance and protection against massive loss. This article serves as a guide to test wealth management systems.

Reasons for testing Wealth Management Systems

Following are the major reasons why wealth management systems must be tested:

  • Optimization of Customer Experience: Wealth management systems are the backbone of customer wealth creation. Therefore, their accuracy and timely service are important to optimize the customer experience. Acceptance testing can be helpful to ensure that the software meets the expectations of the users.
  • Obtain Understanding of Workflows: Testing helps in obtaining a thorough understanding of the workflows of the organization and assessing whether all the important workflows are operating independently. As banking systems handle innumerable transactions and, therefore, possess multi-layered workflows and are highly complex, understanding the workflow and testing the systems become a necessity. It also assures their security and transparency.
  • Detection and Correction of Performance Issues: Testing will allow the organization to determine major issues and loopholes in performance. This can create major obstacles in the performance of the systems and overall customer experience. After detection, the anomalies can be corrected to obtain desired results.
  • Improves User Retention: System testing helps to know how many users the system can accommodate, and the time taken to perform various functions. This will give a thorough idea of the performance of the system and the user-specific changes that shall be undertaken. This makes the system more user-friendly and helps in overall user retention.

Challenges associated with testing Wealth Management Systems

Following are the major challenges associated with testing wealth management systems:

  • Security Loopholes: Financial data is sensitive and vulnerable. Therefore, security is paramount. There might arise variations in networks and operating systems that can lead to a lapse in security features. Therefore, software testing becomes important to ensure that it adheres to the set security standards across all the networks, operating systems, and platforms.
  • Multiple Devices: Another important challenge that arises in the testing of wealth management systems is their operations on multiple devices. Each device may have separate configurations and installations that directly affect its security levels. For instance, a device operating in one OS may be more secure than the one operating in a different OS. Also, certain devices may have different functionalities and software support that can lead to reduced efficiency.
  • Lack of Knowledge: Testing experts are not necessarily finance experts. While they specialize in software, they may lack knowledge of the finance domain. This can create obstacles during the testing process that should be taken care of. Appropriate coordination between the testing and finance teams can help mitigate this challenge.

Testing Finacle Wealth Management System

Following are the major tests associated with Finacle Wealth Management Systems:

  • UI/UX Testing: A proper UI/UX is essential to ensure that the customers have a smooth experience. UI/UX testing optimizes the overall customer experience and helps organizations adopt a user-friendly approach to designing and maintaining systems.
  • Functional Testing: Here, the systems are tested for their functional designs and specifications. This is to ensure that the specifications as required by the users are satisfied by the systems.
  • Performance Testing: Performance testing is key to ensuring that the system delivers performance up to the benchmark when it comes to responsiveness, sustainability, and stability.
  • Security Testing: Security testing helps identify loopholes in security breaches and mitigate the associated risks. Data handled by wealth management systems are susceptible to manipulation, hence it is essential to ensure the security of the systems and data.
  • Integration Testing: Integration testing is essential to check whether different units and functionalities of the software interact properly. While the units and functionalities are tested separately as well, it is essential to test them in sets to ensure that they work properly when operated together.
  • Data Migration Testing: Technology keeps on evolving, and therefore, it becomes important to optimize the existing systems or create new ones. This involves the migration of data from one system to another which can make data vulnerable to security breaches and inaccuracy. It, thus, becomes important to conduct data migration testing to ensure that the migrated data matches the original data.
  • Regression Testing: Certain changes might be carried out in the existing codes and backend of the software. In such cases, it is important to conduct regression testing to ensure that it does not impact software functionality and that an application still functions as it was expected.

Important aspects of Finacle Wealth Management Systems

Following are the important aspects of Finacle Wealth Management Systems:

  • A Complete Solution: The Finacle Wealth Management Systems offer a complete wealth management solution offering a wide range of investment products and services. It allows transacting across multiple different asset classes including, but not limited to Equity, Mutual Funds, Insurance, Bonds, Futures & Options, Exchange Traded Funds, etc.
  • Client-Focused Approach: Finacle Wealth Management System ensures a holistic understanding of the client requirements and empowers experts to make better decisions. It facilitates the evaluation of clients’ risk scores and builds an ideal and personalized portfolio and visualization of the same. It also alerts whenever there is a deviation from the portfolio.
  • Low Cost to Income Ratio: Finacle Wealth Management Systems ensures automation and better operational efficiency. While the front office becomes smarter, the back-office operations witness efficient operations.
  • Use of Advanced Technology: Finacle Wealth Management Systems use advanced technology that is open for collaboration and works on the principle of interoperability. The systems are cloud-ready and can support multi-entity, multi-lingual, multi-currency, multi-national, and multi-time zone operations.

Therefore, it is important to ensure that the Finacle Wealth Management Systems are tested for their performance, accuracy, and functionalities for running the operations in an orderly manner.

At Yethi, we have undertaken various transformational projects, project upgrades and Business-as-usual. We have tested Finacle Wealth Management Systems for some of the major banks and financial institutions. Our end-to-end testing services include functional (Data Migration Audit, System Integration Testing, User Acceptance Testing, Regression Testing, and Automated Testing and non-functional testing (Performance Testing, Security Testing, and UI/UX Testing). Our Test Centre of Excellence is equipped to offer extensive advisory services and reengineer the process.

Yethi’s 5th generation codeless test automation solution, Tenjin a plug-and-play banking aware solution, which minimizes the manual effort and speed up the test execution regardless of the complexity and number of updates. Tenjin’s intuitive features and robotic capabilities enable learning and adapting to application updates with ease.