Volt and Australian Financial Group launch first BaaS-powered products

Neobank Volt and Australian Financial Group (AFG) have released two consumer offerings via Volt’s banking-as-a-service (BaaS) platform.  

Volt and AFG announced the launch of a personal finance app ‘Handl. by AFG’, and a white-labelled home loan product, ‘AFG Home Loans Sparc’ through the BaaS service.

Handl. by AFG app gives users access to personal financial management tools such as budgeting and financial overviews and provides access to Volt bank accounts. 

The AFG Home Loans' Sparc product presents various interest rates for owner-occupiers and investors with less than 80 percent loan-to-value ratio loans.

This is the first major announcement from the two companies since forming a strategic alliance in July this year which saw AFG invest $15 million into Volt in return for using Volt’s BaaS service.

Plans to release a white labelled personal finance manager app to AFG Home Loans and AFG broker customers were first discussed during the partnership leading to a trial of the new products.

Both the app and home loan product were trialled through a pilot encompassing 125 AFG brokers and their clients, which all now have access to the new products.  

A total of 3050 AFG brokers are expected to have the capabilities rolled out to them in early 2022.

Further features may see Volt and AFG improve the decisioning process of AFG Securities, developing more non-mortgage related white label products, and access Volt’s digital banking deposit products for customers of AFG brokers.

AFG chief executive David Bailey said the new services ensured consumers and brokers “have the best opportunity to participate in the benefits of open banking as it builds across the market.”

“By harnessing Volt’s nimble banking solutions, we are delivering innovative solutions for our brokers and their customers, and giving them the tools they need to succeed," Bailey said.

“We look forward to expanding the rollout across our entire portfolio of Australia’s leading mortgage brokers.”