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Banking

Plaid in a decision flow.

6 Plaid operations a decision flow can call directly, with the credentials your own contract issued. The response is data the rest of the flow reads, branches on, and keeps in the trace.

Category
Banking
Type
Integration
Authentication
API key headers
Test environment
Separate sandbox host

Who they are

Bank account connectivity: balances, transactions and income.

Plaid connects an applicant's bank accounts, with their consent, and returns balances, transaction history, account and identity details, and income derived from them. It is the common route to evidencing affordability from what actually moves through an account rather than from a stated figure.

What a flow can call

6 operations, each one a step you can place on the canvas.

  1. POST/link/token/create

    Start a bank connection (Link token)

    First step. Creates the short-lived token that initialises Plaid Link in the member's browser or app; the member picks their bank and logs in there, so credentials never touch us.

  2. POST/item/public_token/exchange

    Exchange the public token

    Second step. Link hands the front end a short-lived public_token; this trades it for the long-lived access_token that every data call needs.

  3. POST/transactions/sync

    Pull transactions (sync)

    The current way to read transactions. Returns added, modified and removed entries since the cursor you last saw; omit cursor on the first call and store body.next_cursor for the next one.

  4. POST/transactions/get

    Pull transactions for a date range

    Date-windowed alternative to sync — use it when you want exactly the last N months for an affordability calculation rather than an incremental feed.

  5. POST/credit/bank_income/get

    Get bank-derived income

    Income inferred from deposit history — the cash-flow underwriting answer for a member with a thin file.

  6. POST/credit/payroll_income/get

    Get payroll income

    Income from the member connecting their payroll provider or uploading a pay document — stronger evidence than deposit inference when it is available.

Where it sits in the decision

Banking calls have a natural place in a flow.

Bank data answers the question a stated income cannot: what actually arrives, how regularly, and what leaves again. It is usually pulled once per application and then read by several nodes — affordability, income verification, any rule about balance volatility — so it is worth fetching early and deriving from, rather than calling repeatedly.

Whatever Plaid returns is part of the run, so it is part of the record. When someone asks months later why an applicant was declined, the answer cites what came back at the time rather than re-fetching from a service whose answer has since changed.

  • 01Add Plaid as a connection authenticating with API key headers.
  • 02Plaid runs a separate sandbox host, so a Sandbox flow can exercise the real call without touching production.
  • 03Place a Connection node and pick an operation — “Start a bank connection (Link token)” is usually the first one a flow needs.
  • 04Map the response into the fields your rules read, then test the whole path before it carries live traffic.

Common questions

Using Plaid in a flow.

How do I connect Plaid to a decision flow?

Add Plaid as a connection in your workspace authenticating with API key headers, with the credentials your own contract issued — ArboRule calls the provider as you, and never holds a contract on your behalf. Once the connection exists, any flow in the workspace can place a Connection node and choose one of its operations. The credentials live on the connection, not in the flow, so a policy owner can use Plaid in a decision without ever seeing the secret.

Can I test Plaid without touching production?

Yes. Plaid runs a separate sandbox host, so a flow executing in Sandbox can make the real call against test credentials and you can read the actual response shape in the trace before anything reaches a customer. The flow does not change when it graduates — only which credentials answer.

What can a flow call on Plaid?

6 operations, including “Start a bank connection (Link token)”, “Exchange the public token”, “Pull transactions (sync)”. Each one is a step you place on the canvas and map into the fields your rules read, and most flows start with “Start a bank connection (Link token)”. The list comes from the same manifest the engine uses to make the call, so this page cannot describe an operation the product does not have.

Where in a decision should Plaid be called?

Bank data answers the question a stated income cannot: what actually arrives, how regularly, and what leaves again. It is usually pulled once per application and then read by several nodes — affordability, income verification, any rule about balance volatility — so it is worth fetching early and deriving from, rather than calling repeatedly.

Also in Banking

Ready when you are

Wire Plaid into a real decision.

Build the flow in Sandbox, connect your account, and watch the decision pull what it needs before it answers.

Read the docs