First Direct partners with Bud to include spending data into app

The new feature provides customers insight into their spending and provides the business with a set of flexible and robust insights to underpin a suite of new features scheduled for release later in 2021. To start off with, transactions will be tagged into one of over 100 categories, with Bud’s identification service being used to recognise around 3,000 UK merchants at launch.

This appears to be the first step in the broader overhaul of First Direct, with features including an in-app marketplace and personalised recommendations yet to arrive. In the last few months Bud has signed several significant partnerships, including with New Zealand’s largest bank ANZ and with credit scoring app Credit Karma.

In 2019 HSBC signed a three-year global partnership with Bud, that came after the bank took part in a USD 20 million funding round for the fintech.