Many fintechs and banks are experimenting with how to best deploy AI technology.
Starling Bank is rolling out what it says is the “UK’s first agentic AI financial assistant”, as it looks to leverage the new technology to help improve day-to-day banking.
The UK challenger bank, which has nearly five million customers, said that Starling Assistant can help its customers manage day-to-day finances, share personalised financial insights and give general banking guidance.
The assistant responds to voice and natural language prompts before carrying out banking tasks on the customer’s behalf, from setting up personalised saving goals to organising bill payments.
Examples of what it can do include if a customer is planning a holiday, they could say: “I need to save £500 for a trip to Paris in July. How much do I need to save monthly and can you set up automatic transfers to a dedicated space?”
Or if a customer wants to perfect their payday routine, they could say: “Set me up with dedicated spaces for my groceries, bills, travel and eating out” and then specify how much to transfer to each space on pay day.
Harriet Rees, Starling’s group chief information officer, said: “It’s time to embrace a new era of banking, one that’s powered by agentic AI.
“At Starling, we want to encourage our customers to trust that AI can help them with money management and we’re excited to be pioneering the use of this cutting-edge technology to help people be good with money.”
The assistant is built on Starling’s proprietary tech platform using Google Gemini and Google Cloud technologies.
Previously, Starling has launched several generative AI tools, including Spending Intelligence, which lets customers ask natural language questions about their spending habits, while Scam Intelligence helps detect online marketplace scams.
Many fintechs and neobanks are using or experimenting with generative AI tech. Across Europe, Klarna uses it for customer service purposes while Bunq launched its AI assistant in 2024. Danish challenger Lunar says its GenAI-powered voice assistant will handle around 75 per cent of customer calls over time.
Meanwhile, Revolut is exploring a push into the AI agent space, aiming to use the technology to automate everything from customer service to sales.