How bank syncing works
What happens when you link your bank to Worthberry through Akahu, what we can and can't see, and how to stop it.
When you link a bank, Worthberry doesn't log in to your bank and it never sees your password. The connection goes through Akahu, an open finance platform for New Zealand, and Worthberry only asks to read. And the people at Worthberry can't see your balances: they're for you, not us.
Who does what
| Who | What they do |
|---|---|
| Your bank | Checks it's really you when you sign in on its own secure screen. |
| Akahu | Asks which accounts you want to share and, with your consent, passes their balances and transactions on to us. You can see and withdraw that consent at my.akahu.nz. |
| Worthberry | Receives read-only data for the accounts you chose and turns it into your net worth, budgets and goals. |
What the app receives
- Account names, types and balances for the accounts you choose.
- Transactions on those accounts: date, description, amount and, where your bank provides it, the merchant.
- KiwiSaver and investment balances, where your provider is available through Akahu.
What we can't do
- Make payments, move money or change anything at your bank. Worthberry only asks to read.
- See accounts you didn't tick when you linked.
- See your banking password or your two-step codes.
Our team can't see your balances
Your balances and transactions go to your Worthberry, not to a person. The tools our team uses to run Worthberry, including the console we use for support, show your email address and which plan you're on. They don't show your balances, your transactions or the names of your accounts, and helping you with a question doesn't need them.
- Nobody browses your money. The only reason anyone at Worthberry would ever open your financial data is to fix a problem with your account that you've asked us to look at, and only the few people who run Worthberry have that access.
- It's locked away. Your data is stored in Australia on encrypted disks, and the keys that let us read your accounts from Akahu are encrypted again on their own.
- It's never sold. We don't sell your data, and the ads on the free plan never use it.
Want to check your numbers somewhere public? Tap the eye next to your net worth, or double-tap the figure, and every balance blurs on your screen too.
Free (Seedling) accounts can't link banks. You can still import statements and enter balances by hand. Linking is on Sprout and above, and on every account during the private beta.
How often it updates
Worthberry fetches new data from Akahu regularly, and you can sync at any time from Accounts. Banks decide when they share a transaction, so pending card purchases often don't show until they've cleared, and some banks are slower over weekends and public holidays.
Consent, and why you'll be asked again
Your consent sits with Akahu, and from time to time you'll be asked to confirm it. When that's coming up, the Connections list in Accounts shows the date. If it lapses, syncing pauses and the app shows a Reconnect button. Nothing you've already synced is lost.
Stopping it
You can disconnect a bank in Accounts, withdraw consent at my.akahu.nz, or delete your Worthberry account, which withdraws our access straight away. Any of the three stops new data coming in.
If you withdraw consent at Akahu rather than in the app, we delete our access token straight away and show a Reconnect button. If you don't reconnect within 30 days, we delete the accounts and transactions that came from Akahu.