5 Tips for Testing Mobile Banking Apps

December 16, 2020

Mobile banking is a trend that’s quickly gaining traction with consumers for the ease and contactless convenience it offers. From depositing a check by simply taking a photo of it to transferring funds from one account to another with just a few simple taps on your device, mobile banking aims to deliver the speed and mobility modern users expect.

With dozens of new and agile players bursting onto the mobile banking scene, the competition is fierce. To keep pace, app teams need to be able to deliver innovative functionality on an accelerated release schedule. Automation and the ability to perfect digital experiences on day one are paramount.

But can your existing tools and processes meet the rapidly evolving requirements of this brave new world?

Check out: A Complete Guide to Functional Testing

Here’s what we recommend.

1. Ensure security compliance with an on-premises appliance

Banks and financial institutions are particularly vulnerable to security breaches and typically have a stringent set of requirements for the storage, communication, and handling of sensitive data.

Many device farms only offer test devices in a cloud-based shared pool with other users which naturally present data concerns for their customers. Even when dedicated device options are available, most commodity device farms are often limited in their ability to match HeadSpin enterprise-grade security features:

A physically secure enclosure for devices with an electronic lock and associated access audit log (PIN-based).
Audit trail of all actions performed on devices and hosts.
A dedicated VPC that controls data access—no traffic leaves the isolated network.
Bifurcated data storage and retention in the HeadSpin Cloud. Data and services are private to each customer account—they are not shared across organization.

The HeadSpin Appliance additionally offers:

Device stability with a temperature-controlled enclosure that mitigates device burnouts
Portability. Can be deployed rack-mounted in a data center, air-gapped in your home office, or on-the-go for drive tests
RF access. Although housed inside a physical box, HeadSpin’s SIM-enabled devices can nonetheless connect to local carrier and WiFi networks without any attenuation of signal.

Read: Everything You Need to Know About the HeadSpin PBox

2. Automate voice and accessibility testing

Many app teams struggle with audio testing use cases, and the QA process for these is often extremely manual even in an otherwise automated test environment. HeadSpin’s sophisticated audio analysis APIs are highly differentiated in the industry enabling fully integrated end-to-end automation testing for voice and audio use cases.

By integrating HeadSpin’s audio APIs into their test automation scripts, our customers are able to automatically verify if the correct audio is being played. This is especially critical for accessibility testing to verify if the audio output is a match to the text on the screen. Another common use case is for testing interactive voice response (IVR) systems. For example, for the case where a banking customer calls in to check the balance on their account, HeadSpin’s audio analysis can verify if the system is delivering the correct automated response.

Audio testing automation with HeadSpin is extremely easy and can be accomplished in a few simple steps.

HeadSpin’s AV solution enables testing by capturing the user experience of real media devices, including actual screen and audio output. Know more!

3. Test your apps where your users are

It’s no use testing an app on a device in New York, if your customer is in Paris. With 50+ locations all over the world, HeadSpin allows you to test your apps where your users are.

‍

Why does this matter?

Low latency: The HeadSpin software runs locally within the device tray and automation tests execute with little to no latency on the target devices. You can manually tap around on devices through our remote-control workbench in near real time.
Regional “last mile” effects: A large number of location-specific factors can significantly impact a user’s digital experience. These range from the local carrier network signal to edge effects from CDN, API/3rd party or cloud calls. HeadSpin’s in-depth performance analysis can pinpoint these effects, and give you AI-powered recommendations on the relative impact of the issues identified and how to resolve them.
Localization testing: You can test localized versions of your apps for functional and performance issues with HeadSpin’s unique user experience KPIs and page content analysis. Our state-of-the-art computer vision and machine learning techniques can automatically identify localization issues and help you verify if you are meeting international compliance requirements (e.g., if the correct version of an ad is being displayed in-product).

Test your mobile apps on real devices in 50+ locations worldwide. Learn more.

4. Just say no to SDKs

Instrumenting third party vendor code can often present a compliance issue, especially for banking apps that handle sensitive data.

To work around this, mobile development teams will oftentimes fork the app into two branches: one version of the app (with SDK) for testing and another version (without SDK) that is deployed live. This is obviously not ideal, neither for catching the maximum number of issues during testing nor for monitoring the live app.

HeadSpin stands apart from most device farm vendors with its Digital Experience AI Platform that delivers in-depth performance visibility and quality of experience testing for mobile and browser-based apps. Unlike most mobile performance monitoring products, however, HeadSpin does not require the installation of a proprietary SDK, or any other modification of the app code.

5. Look for a partner, not just a vendor

At HeadSpin, we work closely with you to ensure your testing requirements are met, from functional, performance, and regression testing to ensuring the security, accessibility, compliance, and global consistency of your mobile banking solution. Our teams are available to help you get the most out of your investment and assure optimal digital experiences for your customers.

FAQs

1. What is banking domain testing?

Banking Domain Testing is a software testing procedure that evaluates the performance, functionality, and security of a banking application. The primary objective of banking application testing is to ensure that all operations and functionalities of financial software are error-free and secure.

‍2. What is UAT testing in banking apps?

User Acceptance Testing refers to the final testing stage that is performed to ensure that the banking app is free of vulnerabilities and compliant with the real-world scenario.

3. What are the common challenges that are faced by quality assurance specialists when testing banking applications?

The most common challenges that testers face while testing mobile banking apps are:

Implementation of a strict security system
Integrations with different tools
Working with complex databases
Active device support
Real-time data support

‍4. What are the different banking domain testing use cases?

QA specialists review both positive and negative scenarios to identify all system vulnerabilities during the preparation of test cases for mobile banking apps. Some of the testing use cases in banking apps are: