A good demo opens the door, but the bank’s risk process decides the deal. Two industry voices and one bank explain the sponsors, pilots and security reviews that stand between a fintech and its first bank customer.

Banks are some of the most valuable customers a fintech can win. They bring scale, credibility and long contracts. Yet selling to banks is slow, and many founders find out too late that a keen innovation team is not the same as a signed deal. As a result, the first bank customer often takes far longer than the business plan assumed.

So we asked industry leaders one question: what does it take for a fintech to sell its product to a bank, and how long did your first deal take? We wanted timelines and lessons learned. Two respondents answered. Neither has closed a bank deal, so we set their replies against what banks and regulators say about the process.

Fintechbits analysis

Why selling to banks takes so long

Regulation shapes the timeline for selling to banks. In June 2023, the Federal Reserve, FDIC and OCC issued joint guidance on how banks should manage third parties, Morrison Foerster explains. It sets out a life cycle of planning, due diligence, contract negotiation, ongoing monitoring and termination. The depth of each stage depends on how risky and critical the vendor is. So selling to banks means passing a process the bank must follow by law, not just persuading a buyer.

Timelines for selling to banks vary widely. NayaOne sells tools that speed up fintech onboarding. One of its case studies described a large UK bank whose process for onboarding third parties took 12 to 18 months. That is a single example from a vendor, but it matches what many founders report about large banks.

Approval is not a purchase

Our first respondent leads a risk management company. He framed his answer as planning advice rather than first-hand experience.

“Selling technology to a bank takes more than proving the product works. You have to show it can run securely, fit with existing systems and satisfy procurement, compliance and operational risk teams. A good demo can create interest, but the deal only moves when the bank can justify the implementation risk, the ongoing cost and the business value.

The biggest commercial mistake is treating the first product approval as the buying decision. IT teams check compatibility and security, finance looks at total cost of ownership, legal reviews contract exposure and operations examines what implementation involves. I’d plan around six to 12 months for a complex banking integration, as a planning assumption rather than a guaranteed timeline. The variable people overlook is the bank’s own capacity to complete reviews and free up technical staff.

Set three milestones before committing serious resources: technical feasibility, a commercial case and procurement readiness. Prepare security documents, integration specifications, service-level commitments and an implementation plan early. Track how long each approval stage takes and who is responsible for moving it forward.”

Omer Malik, CEO, ORM Systems

Founders selling to banks often miss his point about bank capacity. A fintech can answer every question in a week and still wait months, because the bank’s security and legal teams review many vendors at once. Therefore, founders should ask early how many reviews are in the queue and who owns each one. His six to 12 months is a planning guess. For a large bank, the NayaOne example suggests longer.

What one bank checks

ConnectOne Bank, a US commercial bank, offered a rare view of selling to banks from the buyer’s side in September. Its chief brand and innovation officer, Siya Vansia, told InformationWeek that vendors pass through compliance, fraud, IT security and credit reviews. She asks about a vendor’s financial health and whether it has SOC 2 testing, an independent audit of security controls. She also asks how critical the vendor would be, which decides how much data and access it gets.

Her view on early-stage firms is encouraging for founders selling to banks. “Some new partners are early stage, and sometimes I like that,” she said, because the bank can help shape the product. However, she also warned that banks weigh the knock-on effects of any product. “We don’t want to solve one problem in one place,” she said.

Sponsor, pilot, questionnaire

Our second respondent advises software sellers on enterprise deals and gave the most practical sequence, while noting she has not closed a bank deal herself.

“A bank buys from a fintech once someone inside the bank is sponsoring it by name, and once security and compliance have signed off before anyone talks price. I haven’t closed a bank deal myself, so I can’t give you a first-deal timeline. My experience is in advising software sellers on enterprise deals. Start with a small pilot, because it gives your sponsor something to show procurement. Once the pilot is agreed, ask for the bank’s security questionnaire straight away rather than waiting until it ends. Then let the pilot run until your sponsor has results they can put in front of procurement.”

Lilach Bullock, AI Implementation Consultant and Fractional CMO, Lilach Bullock

Her advice on the security questionnaire may save the most time when selling to banks. Security reviews often run longer than the pilot itself, and they are the step founders selling to banks most often start too late. Starting them in parallel means the paperwork is ready when the pilot ends. In addition, a named sponsor gives the deal an owner inside the bank, which matters when budgets and priorities shift.

How to prepare

Taken together, the answers and the bank’s view point to a clear order of work for selling to banks. First, find a named sponsor who owns the problem you solve. Next, prepare a security pack before the first meeting, including SOC 2 or similar reports, financial statements and data handling details. Then propose a small, time-boxed pilot with agreed success measures. Finally, start the security and compliance review as soon as the pilot is agreed, not after.

Selling to banks is not the only route that triggers these reviews. Banking-as-a-service providers go through the same third-party process, as our explainer on banking-as-a-service describes. Deposit partnerships face close checks too, as our report on business deposits at sponsor banks showed. Banks are also building some tools in-house, as our report on TD Credit Assist found.

What to watch next

Several trends will shape selling to banks in 2027. AI tools are adding new review questions on model risk and data use, which may lengthen security checks. In the UK and EU, operational resilience rules are pushing banks to map critical suppliers more closely. Meanwhile, more banks are setting up sandboxes and fintech programmes to run pilots faster.

Above all, the lesson on selling to banks is consistent. A bank buys when it trusts it can manage a product’s risk for years, not when it likes the demo. Fintechs that plan for the risk process from day one will close their first bank deal faster.

FintechBits covers payments, banking and fintech developments for readers in the US and UK. This article is for information only and is not financial advice. Views expressed are those of the FintechBits editorial team.