Banking Powered Dating App

General Chat
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Hello All,

I’ve been working on a side project, it’s a little out there, but do try to keep an open mind. It’s a open-banking powered dating app.

A lot of my friends (early-late 30 city workers) have been trying really hard to find that special someone to settle down with. Most of them are on all the standard dating apps/sites (Tinder, Match, Bumble, POF, etc). Unfortunately they haven’t been having much luck and some of their complaints have been “They just lie”, “I/They got bored”, “We’re too different”, “Too many fake/obscene profiles” and “They weren’t what I was expecting”. It seems like quality matches are hard to come by and not necassarily by the other party.

So I started experimenting. Is it possible to get to know a persons traits, preferred lifestyle, interests and habits without their involvement? Essentially creating a smart profile. That’s where finances came in. You can clearly reveal and reason a lot about a person from their transaction data. I’ve started building a service to match people based on their data, all you need to do is link your bank account.

It provides a overall match on a few high level categories (health, social, travel, money). Each category is composed of several metrics that form the score. You’re then presented with potential matches. Financial data is not shown and not even stored after the initial analysis.

It’s still early on so it would be a great time to receive some feedback. A common issue is that some people may not feel comfortable with linking accounts, so it might not be compelling enough for some. Linking accounts could have some positive effect though, reducing the number of fake accounts. Not to mention this would require FCA approval if it were to ever work.

I’d be extremely greatful for the community to share their thoughts. Good or bad, I’d rather have honest opinions that can discussed.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for your time! :blush:

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Wouldn’t openbanking API’s be helpful in due time? you won’t be making changes to accounts, just reading data and throwing it somewhere else to do ‘matching magic’.

I personally find this interesting on a technical level, but I am going to make an assumption that:

  1. People will be hesitant to trust a dating app with finance info

  2. Not alot of people are willing to look in the mirror financially lol, I can imagine the results of a perfect match being far different to a persons ‘desired type’ and said person rejecting the entire idea lol :rofl:

But keep at it! innovation in any direction is innovation! :slight_smile:

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My partners spending habits are nothing like mine, so not sure how we’d match :man_shrugging: Interesting concept, guess I’d have to see it before I can judge it properly :slight_smile:

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Thanks for the feedback!

Actually, that’s exactly how it works. Read-only via API’s, process, throw away.

On point 1, this would certainly need to be earned and full transparency with the user is a must.

On point 2, financial health is only a small part of it. It’s actually looking for signals. For example, are you an adventurous person vs someone who prefers luxury. Do you prefer someone who saves or spends? You’d also be able to filter, so you can effectively say, ‘I don’t care if they’re an impulsive buyer’ or ‘Income isn’t important to me’.

Certainly “banking” on being able to earn people’s trust and I do think there are ways to achieve that, given time. People have every right to be wary, especially in today’s world. I’d also love for people to get involved, so if anyone is interested, please do reach out.

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Thanks Ordog!

As soon as a demo is ready I’ll let you know. In the case of your partners spending habits, you’d be able to adjust this trait in your search :slight_smile:

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Ahh ok, makes sense. I still have tonnes of questions as you’d expect with something new like this :smiley:

For example. I don’t particularly eat very healthy during the day and I often order for everyone in the office too. So my spending habits would make people assume I’m unhealthy and the size of a house which is not the case at all :rofl:

I don’t need to find a partner but I’ll be sure to take a look from a technical perspective when you’re ready because it sounds interesting :slight_smile:

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It’s great to see the old “I was only looking at it from a technical perspective” excuse making a long overdue comeback. :wink::wink:

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:rofl::rofl::rofl:

I’ll need to include “It’s not what it looks like” too :laughing:

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So I’m guessing that you’d be able to choose which of the results you share on your profile, once the app’s done the analysis?

I like the idea because -

  • It’ll save time completing a profile
  • You could effectively show ‘verified’ details about the person e.g. that they really do like / do the things that they say they do
  • If you had to link a bank account or at least, the app shows whether the person has or not, you’d remove bots from the equation
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Haha, yes, that’s exactly what I said to my wife. Thankfully she’s extremely cool and supportive.

edit I hit send by accident.
@Ordog, I did think about cases like this and it wouldn’t suggest you’re unhealthy for something like a few big spends in McDonalds. It is also looking for things like gym memberships, activites, etc.

Would love to share more once I’m ready :slight_smile:

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I guess you’d only see the profiles of people who banked at specific banks, which might limit the pool a bit.

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Tbh, I’d not thought about choosing to share specific results. It might make sense in terms of being transparent, so good shout.

The idea was to do the processing in the background, because it can potentially present people with interests that you might not otherwise share. For example, I’m a retro video game fan. I like to collect NES games, that’s probably not what I would share on a dating app. In this case, I wouldn’t need to, it would happen in the background and potentially match me with others who have a similar interest but wouldn’t admit.

In terms of your bullet points, you’re exactly right with all of them. To highlight point two,…you might like ‘strawberry jam’ on your social media app, but it doesn’t mean you would actually buy it, so in that context you never REALLY know if you like strawberry jam.

I’ll have a think about how we might choose results without giving people the power to ‘game’ the system. I do like it.

Thanks!

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I’m after someone who has a gym membership but their spending habits indicate the only exercise they get is eating pizza, and they’re too lazy to cancel the gym.

I’m hopeful this is an option.

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Ah ok, I see what you mean. I was guessing that you’d show the ‘findings’ on the user’s profile to give other people a better sense of why they’ve matched & make starting conversations easier. But I like the sound of what you have in mind too :slight_smile:

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Well, it’s ast least all the major and challenger banks. In the city I suspect it would cover the majority of people that might be interested.

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I’m looking for someone with a mutual love of having their left to spend turn orange 3 days into the month

Shows they’re the kind who likes to live on the edge

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I think you’re describing a Ninja Turtle!

Totally Radical Cowabunga mode is definitely going to be an option! :smiley:

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Precisely, good idea on listing the findings on a user’s profile. That might open up a host of other potential features too.

Something that has been suggested to me a few times is to skip the conversation option. Let me track back. The plan (to be implemented) is to be able to book a date in app (via opentable/etc). On a few occasions it had been suggested that it might be a good idea to encourage real dates by only opening up conversation a few hours before an active date.

Realistically though, this is a little way off, but it’d be nice if it could make dating feel more natural.

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I like the idea of using financial data to get people’s traits etc ,

Maybe I’m just thinking of the easier way out but patent the idea and try license/sell it to an already established dating app as I personally think the market is quite saturated.

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Thanks Kolok, that is certainly something to consider. I’ve never been through the patent process, not sure if I can once information is made public, unless it’s specifics?