Bank of America: Businesses Adopt APIs to Accelerate Data Reporting and Payments

A growing number of business clients and network participants are using Bank of America application programming interfaces (APIs) to enable payment transactions and other capabilities.

Over the last 12 months, the bank has seen the number of clients using APIs for real-time treasury needs increase by 51% and the number of network participants like treasury management systems (TMS) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) providers grow to 55, Bank of America said in a Tuesday (Oct. 22) press release emailed to PYMNTS.

The APIs are available via the bank’s digital banking platform, CashPro, and via the network participants, according to the release.

Business clients are using the bank’s APIs because of simplified onboarding, accelerated speed to transact and accessibility through the network participants, per the release.

“CFOs face enormous pressure to know their exposure and cash position at any given time,” Tom Durkin, head of CashPro in Global Payment Solutions (GPS) at Bank of America, said in the release. “APIs play a strategic role in positioning companies to act on information quickly, in a fully automated and secure manner.”

Growth in the use of APIs has also been driven by the CashPro Developer Studio that speeds up the API onboarding experience, according to the release.

APIs are one of the most powerful tools reshaping treasury operations, and treasury teams are reaping the benefits of the collaborations they enable, PYMNTS reported Monday (Oct. 21). They have become indispensable in the corporate finance ecosystem by allowing seamless integration and communication between various financial systems, enabling automation, and providing real-time data access.

Business needs around data reporting and payments have never been greater, making simplifying the integration of solutions that can support those needs crucial to growth, Meg Garand, head of CashPro Payments and CashPro API at Bank of America, told PYMNTS in an interview posted in July.

“When we think about cash flow and the payment insights and other insights that clients can have based on their transactional data through API, that same data is integrated into the client’s ERP and TMS, so the insight can be gained within their ecosystem as well,” Garand said.