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Show HN: Slackbot for founders to track their startup's finances

60 points by ashnkumar 11y ago

fiatjaf 11y ago
Would this be a useful app without Slack?
- HenryTheHorse 11y ago
  Yes. One would log into their bank website/app and into Quickbooks. What am I missing?
- juecd 11y ago
  We also allow email notifications but figure most teams prefer to integrate through Slack.
juecd 11y ago
We made a Slackbot for startups to tell them some simple financial metrics (how much is in their bank account, and what their latest transactions in those accounts are). We're connecting to company accounts through Plaid (plaid.com) and sending them a financial 'digest' through Slack/email each morning. As consumers we've been using a couple apps like Digit (digit.co) to track our personal finances but couldn't find a push-based version for companies. Logging into our company bank accounts to keep track of transactions has been pretty painful (online business banking UI is really hard to navigate) so hopefully this can make the process easier. We want to eventually incorporate burn-rate to help founders stay on top of their company's money. Would love any feedback -- thanks!
- Nimsical 11y ago
  Kinda hard to trust company accounts with an external service like this. Is there a way to just give you a downloaded CSV or something for this? If not – how are you managing security?
  - ashnkumar 11y ago
    We're using Plaid to connect to accounts so we're not storing any credentials ourselves. For security when we pull the info to give to people in the digest each morning we're not persisting it anywhere. Interesting point about the CSV (giving us information without bank access); a problem with that though is it defeats the 'push' based idea of giving people information without them having to do any work. Atleast on the consumer side we've found that many people don't keep track of their money because it's too much effort to log in and manually get that information. Thanks for the feedback!
    - melvinmt 11y ago
      You're not storing credentials, but you do store financial data?
- jchung 11y ago
  I'm a founder and the guy in charge of the $$$. This sentence doesn't resonate for me: "Logging into our company bank accounts to keep track of transactions has been pretty painful (online business banking UI is really hard to navigate) so hopefully this can make the process easier." If you've already tested your target customer segment and found that they find this to be "pretty painful", then you can conclude that I'm an outlier. If you have not already done customer discovery, I'd encourage you to check whether this is actually a pain point you can market to. I've found our bank's website to be pretty quick and easy to navigate.
  - ashnkumar 11y ago
    We've used a couple banks ourselves and have talked to people using other ones, we've found them pretty hard to navigate. Some people are using consumer bank accounts at the early stage so it might be easier to use. Appreciate the feedback, we'll keep testing around this.
  - HenryTheHorse 11y ago
    I agree - navigating Quickbooks or a bank website is not that hard if one uses them on a daily basis.
  - tryitnow 11y ago
    I agree with the above. This seems like a "neat to have", but not a huge productivity enhancer. I'm seeing more and more apps like this. It's telling me that a lot of the low-hanging fruit has been picked in this technology cycle and entrepreneurs are looking desperately for unoccupied niches to fill.
graeme 11y ago
Does it support only US banks? I'm in Canada, with US and Canadian accounts.
- juecd 11y ago
  We're only in the US for now (most financial institutions supported). Hoping to expand access in the future!
rietta 11y ago
The amount in the bank account is very, very different than the budget. A startup should not be tracking its money on such a simple basis. Without categories (or envelopes) the amount of cash is pretty meaningless without knowing if is clear to spend.
- juecd 11y ago
  Makes sense. We're starting with accessible (and push-based) information to complement founders' existing systems and then planning to build upon it in the future. Thanks for the feedback!
omni 11y ago
Site feedback: the video at the top of your landing page only shows the output of the bot for 4-5 seconds. Let it linger a bit longer so I can see what you're offering.
- juecd 11y ago
  Got it - appreciate the feedback!
ceejayoz 11y ago
This is potentially enormously sensitive data that'd be very valuable to competitors etc. I'd want to see a much more extensive privacy policy than the current state of https://www.swayfinance.com/privacy https://www.swayfinance.com/privacy, particularly as it's a free service in need of an eventual business model.
- shostack 11y ago
  I'd add that this is all too common with data/analytics startups I've seen. I've seen instances where the first thing they asked you to do is link your Google Analytics account. No privacy/data security policy worth speaking of, no info on the team, nothing. For anyone who deals with this data (analytics, financial, etc.) for their company, particularly if it isn't of the "two guys in a garage with no real revenue" variety, we take data super seriously. I could lose my job (or worse, get sued) if I was negligent in handing out sensitive company data in a way that put the company at risk (let alone actually caused monetary damage to the business). A clear privacy policy, details on the team and information about where the HQ is located (so I can make sure they are in my legal jurisdiction should it ever come to that) are the absolute minimum IMHO.
  - juecd 11y ago
    Physical location and about the team is a great point. Appreciate it!
- juecd 11y ago
  Great point about the privacy policy. It's important to us to make it clear that we're not misusing the information. Thanks for the feedback!
  - dsr_ 11y ago
    No. It's important to your customers that you make it clear that their data is safe. If it isn't, you need to make that clear, too. Right now, I have no basis to extend trust to you, and no desire to do so.
  - 11y ago
flog 11y ago
Why don't you just wire it up to the Xero API instead of the bank accounts?
- mattei 11y ago
  Agree - Xero, Intuit, MYOB, Saasu etc. Lends itself to more than just banking data plus becomes an audience to market directly to.
  - ashnkumar 11y ago
    Really great point. Plugging into SaaS accounting software would be perfect
  - wmboy 11y ago
    Yep, could calculate things like invoices owing, draft invoices that haven't been sent yet, as well as calculating average monthly expenses so you know if everything's looking okay or not. Also, hooking into Xero immediately makes it usable by companies in countries outside USA.
cj 11y ago
There are a ton of Slack apps popping up. Are they typically side projects? Or on the VC / startup path? (This is not a dig at Slack apps, just curious whether people see a big market here)
- rohitv 11y ago
  It is probably because of the $80M fund (http://slackhq.com/post/134878632730/launch-platform http://slackhq.com/post/134878632730/launch-platform) Slack set up for developing apps on their platform.
psawaya 11y ago
This is a really cool idea! Especially excited about the daily updates/reporting
lifeisstillgood 11y ago
Is this a US thing? Getting programmatic access to my UK bank accounts is still a nightmare. I must use a manual download process involving two factor auth each time. A company exists that scrapes the bank sites of all major banks but obv cannot defeat two factor auth so for my accounts package I used to give them my username and then have to enter the two factor each time anyway. I conclude its too dangerous to give other companies my RW login details Basically programmatic access to my accounts - forget it. Differentiated access (RO, RW, fine grained), don't make me laugh. Is this just UK? Is there a better bank Inshoukd move to?

60 points by ashnkumar 11y ago

fiatjaf 11y ago

Would this be a useful app without Slack?

HenryTheHorse 11y ago
Yes. One would log into their bank website/app and into Quickbooks. What am I missing?
juecd 11y ago
We also allow email notifications but figure most teams prefer to integrate through Slack.

juecd 11y ago

We made a Slackbot for startups to tell them some simple financial metrics (how much is in their bank account, and what their latest transactions in those accounts are). We're connecting to company accounts through Plaid (plaid.com) and sending them a financial 'digest' through Slack/email each morning. As consumers we've been using a couple apps like Digit (digit.co) to track our personal finances but couldn't find a push-based version for companies. Logging into our company bank accounts to keep track of transactions has been pretty painful (online business banking UI is really hard to navigate) so hopefully this can make the process easier. We want to eventually incorporate burn-rate to help founders stay on top of their company's money. Would love any feedback -- thanks!

Nimsical 11y ago
Kinda hard to trust company accounts with an external service like this. Is there a way to just give you a downloaded CSV or something for this? If not – how are you managing security?
- ashnkumar 11y ago
  We're using Plaid to connect to accounts so we're not storing any credentials ourselves. For security when we pull the info to give to people in the digest each morning we're not persisting it anywhere. Interesting point about the CSV (giving us information without bank access); a problem with that though is it defeats the 'push' based idea of giving people information without them having to do any work. Atleast on the consumer side we've found that many people don't keep track of their money because it's too much effort to log in and manually get that information. Thanks for the feedback!
  - melvinmt 11y ago
    You're not storing credentials, but you do store financial data?
jchung 11y ago
I'm a founder and the guy in charge of the $$$. This sentence doesn't resonate for me: "Logging into our company bank accounts to keep track of transactions has been pretty painful (online business banking UI is really hard to navigate) so hopefully this can make the process easier." If you've already tested your target customer segment and found that they find this to be "pretty painful", then you can conclude that I'm an outlier. If you have not already done customer discovery, I'd encourage you to check whether this is actually a pain point you can market to. I've found our bank's website to be pretty quick and easy to navigate.
- ashnkumar 11y ago
  We've used a couple banks ourselves and have talked to people using other ones, we've found them pretty hard to navigate. Some people are using consumer bank accounts at the early stage so it might be easier to use. Appreciate the feedback, we'll keep testing around this.
- HenryTheHorse 11y ago
  I agree - navigating Quickbooks or a bank website is not that hard if one uses them on a daily basis.
- tryitnow 11y ago
  I agree with the above. This seems like a "neat to have", but not a huge productivity enhancer. I'm seeing more and more apps like this. It's telling me that a lot of the low-hanging fruit has been picked in this technology cycle and entrepreneurs are looking desperately for unoccupied niches to fill.

graeme 11y ago

Does it support only US banks? I'm in Canada, with US and Canadian accounts.

juecd 11y ago
We're only in the US for now (most financial institutions supported). Hoping to expand access in the future!

rietta 11y ago

The amount in the bank account is very, very different than the budget. A startup should not be tracking its money on such a simple basis. Without categories (or envelopes) the amount of cash is pretty meaningless without knowing if is clear to spend.

juecd 11y ago
Makes sense. We're starting with accessible (and push-based) information to complement founders' existing systems and then planning to build upon it in the future. Thanks for the feedback!

omni 11y ago

Site feedback: the video at the top of your landing page only shows the output of the bot for 4-5 seconds. Let it linger a bit longer so I can see what you're offering.

juecd 11y ago
Got it - appreciate the feedback!

ceejayoz 11y ago

This is potentially enormously sensitive data that'd be very valuable to competitors etc. I'd want to see a much more extensive privacy policy than the current state of https://www.swayfinance.com/privacy https://www.swayfinance.com/privacy, particularly as it's a free service in need of an eventual business model.

shostack 11y ago
I'd add that this is all too common with data/analytics startups I've seen. I've seen instances where the first thing they asked you to do is link your Google Analytics account. No privacy/data security policy worth speaking of, no info on the team, nothing. For anyone who deals with this data (analytics, financial, etc.) for their company, particularly if it isn't of the "two guys in a garage with no real revenue" variety, we take data super seriously. I could lose my job (or worse, get sued) if I was negligent in handing out sensitive company data in a way that put the company at risk (let alone actually caused monetary damage to the business). A clear privacy policy, details on the team and information about where the HQ is located (so I can make sure they are in my legal jurisdiction should it ever come to that) are the absolute minimum IMHO.
- juecd 11y ago
  Physical location and about the team is a great point. Appreciate it!
juecd 11y ago
Great point about the privacy policy. It's important to us to make it clear that we're not misusing the information. Thanks for the feedback!
- dsr_ 11y ago
  No. It's important to your customers that you make it clear that their data is safe. If it isn't, you need to make that clear, too. Right now, I have no basis to extend trust to you, and no desire to do so.
- 11y ago

flog 11y ago

Why don't you just wire it up to the Xero API instead of the bank accounts?

mattei 11y ago
Agree - Xero, Intuit, MYOB, Saasu etc. Lends itself to more than just banking data plus becomes an audience to market directly to.
- ashnkumar 11y ago
  Really great point. Plugging into SaaS accounting software would be perfect
- wmboy 11y ago
  Yep, could calculate things like invoices owing, draft invoices that haven't been sent yet, as well as calculating average monthly expenses so you know if everything's looking okay or not. Also, hooking into Xero immediately makes it usable by companies in countries outside USA.

cj 11y ago

There are a ton of Slack apps popping up. Are they typically side projects? Or on the VC / startup path? (This is not a dig at Slack apps, just curious whether people see a big market here)

rohitv 11y ago
It is probably because of the $80M fund (http://slackhq.com/post/134878632730/launch-platform http://slackhq.com/post/134878632730/launch-platform) Slack set up for developing apps on their platform.

psawaya 11y ago

This is a really cool idea! Especially excited about the daily updates/reporting

lifeisstillgood 11y ago

Is this a US thing? Getting programmatic access to my UK bank accounts is still a nightmare. I must use a manual download process involving two factor auth each time. A company exists that scrapes the bank sites of all major banks but obv cannot defeat two factor auth so for my accounts package I used to give them my username and then have to enter the two factor each time anyway. I conclude its too dangerous to give other companies my RW login details Basically programmatic access to my accounts - forget it. Differentiated access (RO, RW, fine grained), don't make me laugh. Is this just UK? Is there a better bank Inshoukd move to?