Azlo, a digital first bank backed by Spanish bank BBVA, is planning to introduce free cross-border payments. The realtime service is expected to be launched in by the end of the month.
The Francisco-based company targeted Mexico as the service is aimed at foreign business owners. “It can be harder to start a business if you’re a green card holder, and the team was excited to try to fix that problem,” said Brian Hamilton, CEO at Azlo. “That’s a very specific market of people for that corridor, which is good because it lets us focus.”
Azlo is giving consumer access to API keys, free cross-border same day payments, access to the ACH network, credit solutions tailored for the gig economy, and especially in today’s climate, digital account onboarding for resident aliens. Offering technological solutions to modern problems often overlooked by banks creates a nice for Neobanks like Azlo.
The free same-day cross-border payment service is a part of a two-step plan to offer more services to the underbanked. The payment system will utilize established ACH rails until RTP rails are available. Besides Mexico, the bank aims to implement free same-day cross-border payment in approximately 20 more countries by fall.
Because ACH is a treasury management product with a business account, “you probably have to pay $10 a month for that and ¢50 a transaction, but if it was a consumer account […], it’s the same system on the back end” Hamilton said.
Currently, Azlo’s services aim at enabling small business owners and gig economy workers to access the ACH payment network, which is traditionally monopolized by banks. It provides banking services including domestic and international payments, billpay, mobile check deposit and digital invoicing to small businesses and freelancers.
