The end of the year is almost here! We hope you've enjoyed our monthly updates and the new features we've released this year.  In case you missed anything – we've got you covered.  Here are some of our favorite updates from 2021:

Top 5 Okra updates

All new widget

At 13.45Mbps for broadband connections and 17.91Mbps for mobile internet, Nigeria's internet speed ranks among one of the slowest in the world.

To ensure embedded finance is accessible to as many people as possible, the new widget is 20x faster and works fast across all reception levels.  We also improved compatibility across devices, screen sizes and browsers.

Further, we integrated a returning user experience (RUX). This ensures that returning customers get to enjoy quicker logins across apps. If they authenticate their details with one company in the Okra network, with the help of biometrics, they can instantly authenticate themselves when using another application in the network. This eliminates loading times and drastically reduces drop off.

→ Check out the Widget 3.0

Financial integrations

We expanded our coverage to support more financial institutions, including: traditional banks, digital banks and digital wallets, including OPay, Paystack, and Paga.

We also now support 230+ institutions for identity verification (via BVN, NUBAN, Bank Sort code, phone number or our Bank IDs and slugs) to ensure that we are always providing accurate and verified information!

We also optimized connections with our existing coverage to improve scale, speed, and stability. FCMB, Access Bank (Mobile), UBA, Providus are some notable examples.

Payments (Beta)

Okra Payments (Beta) provides payment optionality and flexibility to merchants & consumers by providing access to bank to bank payments on all channels (USSD & Internet Banking) without the need to ever handle a BVN, account number, or an NSF (insufficient funds) error. We also provide easy payment management through the Okra dashboard or via the API where you can:

• View overview stats across all payments
• Create links through the SDKs, our no-code widget, to receive payments from new customers
• Customise your use case to collect one-time, recurring, donation or variable payments from existing customers
• View payment statuses to keep track of all payments — successful, pending, and failed with webhooks to notify your application about a status change
• Manage payouts to retrieve your available funds

Identity

Okra Identity helps you verify a user's identity by accessing their financial information to retrieve a full KYC profile for an individual or corporate entity (including directors) across all banks in Nigeria. You can now do a BVN Check / Retrieval either via our widget or directly via API.

If you don't have your customer's BVN but you still have their account information via proper GDPR / NDPR guidelines, we now allow you to verify a customer's identity using only their account number.

For corporate accounts, you can verify a customer via RC numbers and TIN numbers with our RC/TIN Verification service.

You can also do a NIN Check / Retrieval either via our Widget or directly via our API. You can use the resulting NIN to obtain the KYC profile of your customer and verify them.

Batch identity allows you to initiate a batch of user records in CSV and return the full Okra Identity profile for each user.

Okra Blog

We are committed to accelerating financial service innovation by supporting the growth of our partners and improving knowledge on open finance.

To do this, we're leveraging our blog to share new product innovations, new ecosystem developments, white papers, and inspiring customer stories!

Don’t forget to subscribe.

Thanks for following along!

Content highlights from 2021:

• Selfie Verification: An Extra Security Layer for Fintechs
• Assets and Liabilities: A Tool for Wealth Management
• Spending Patterns: Insights into User Spending Data
• Webhooks: Understanding real-time API requests.
• What are API's: A simplified breakdown for non-engineers
• Microlending: Modest loans made to individuals

🎄Happy Holidays!

We’re taking some time off for the holidays. While our services will be up and running as usual, support responses will be limited between December 20th and January 4th.  If you need anything over the break please email us directly at support@okra.ng.

Thanks for using Okra, see you in 2022!