Overview
Unibench, a leading technology solutions provider, recently completed the development of a cutting-edge Unified Payment Portal for a team augmentation partner. This project aimed to create a robust, scalable, and user-friendly platform to streamline payment operations, enhance reporting capabilities, and improve operational efficiency for merchants and administrators. The portal integrates advanced features to manage transactions, user permissions, compliance, and automated workflows, leveraging a modern technology stack to ensure performance and reliability.
Objectives
- Develop a centralized platform to manage payment operations, including transaction monitoring, reporting, and merchant configurations.
- Enhance user experience with role-based access, real-time insights, and self-service capabilities.
- Automate workflows for profile updates, merchant onboarding, and backend system synchronization.
- Improve compliance, fraud management, and chargeback processes.
- Ensure scalability and performance using cloud-native technologies.
Technology Stack
The Unified Payment Portal was built using a modern, cloud-based technology stack to ensure scalability, security, and real-time performance:
- Backend: Java Spring Boot was used to build RESTful APIs for transaction processing, exchange integration, and merchant settlement workflows.
- Frontend: React and Next.js for a responsive, dynamic user interface.
- Integration and Automation: Workato for workflow automation and system integrations.
- Analytics and Visualization: Grafana for monitoring and alerting, DOMO for advanced business intelligence and reporting.
- Additional Tools: AWS services for hosting, storage, and compute resources, ensuring high availability and scalability.
Key Features
- User Management and Permissions
- Multiple Users, Groups, and Roles: The portal supports a granular permission system, allowing administrators to define user roles and groups with specific access levels. This ensures secure and controlled access to sensitive data and functionalities.
- Compliance Role: A dedicated role for compliance officers to oversee regulatory requirements, monitor transactions, and manage KYC processes.
- Real-Time Reporting
- Comprehensive Dashboards: Real-time reporting dashboards provide insights into transaction volumes, settlement statuses, and payment performance.
- Search and Filter: Users can search and filter transactions using criteria such as date, status, or merchant ID, enabling quick access to relevant data.
- Transaction Management
- Refund Processing: Users can easily locate transactions and process partial or full refunds directly from the portal, streamlining customer support operations.
- Fraud Management: Transactions can be marked as fraudulent, with tools to record investigation details and update fraud rules, thresholds, and limits dynamically.
- Chargeback Process Improvement: The portal simplifies chargeback handling with automated workflows and detailed transaction tracking, reducing manual effort and errors.
- Merchant and Customer Management
- Merchant Onboarding: Administrators can create new merchants, automatically configuring them across all relevant backend systems via Workato-driven workflows.
- Profile Management: Customers can edit their profiles or submit edit requests, triggering a KYC/review workflow. Approved changes are automatically synced to backend systems.
- Merchant Closure and Settlement Holds: Admins can close merchant accounts, hold settlements, or update account statuses as needed.
- Tariff and Settlement Management
- Tariff Visibility and Updates: Customers can view tariff details, while admins can update tariffs to reflect pricing changes.
- Settlement Account Management: Customers can view bank account details for settlements, and admins can update these details securely.
- Monitoring and Compliance
- Monitoring and Alerting: Grafana integration provides real-time monitoring of system performance and transaction anomalies, with alerts for critical issues.
- Compliance Workflows: Automated notifications ensure compliance teams are informed of KYC reviews or regulatory requirements.
- Fraud Investigation Tools: Detailed logging and investigation capabilities for transactions flagged as fraudulent.
Development Process
Unibench adopted an agile methodology to deliver the Unified Payment Portal, collaborating closely with the team augmentation partner to ensure alignment with business needs:
- Requirement Gathering: Conducted workshops to define feature requirements, user roles, and compliance needs.
- Architecture Design: Designed a scalable architecture using AWS, Redshift, and DynamoDB to handle high transaction volumes and real-time reporting.
- Frontend Development: Built a responsive UI with React and Next.js, focusing on usability and performance.
- Backend Development: Implemented core logic in Java, with Workato for automation and DOMO for analytics.
- Testing: Conducted rigorous unit, integration, and user acceptance testing to ensure reliability and security.
- Iteration: Incorporated feedback from stakeholders to refine features and optimize workflows.
Challenges and Solutions
- Challenge: Ensuring seamless integration with multiple backend systems for merchant onboarding and profile updates
- Solution: Leveraged Workato to create automated workflows, reducing manual intervention and ensuring data consistency.
- Challenge: Handling real-time reporting for large transaction volumes.
- Solution: Utilized Amazon Redshift for data warehousing and DOMO for optimized query performance and visualization.
- Challenge: Balancing security with user accessibility for role-based permissions.
- Solution: Implemented a robust permission system with fine-grained controls, validated through extensive testing.
Outcomes
- Enhanced Efficiency:
Automated workflows for merchant onboarding, profile updates, and refunds reduced operational overhead by 40%.
- Improved User Experience:
Real-time reporting, search/filter capabilities, and self-service tools empowered users to manage payments effectively.
- Strengthened Compliance:
Dedicated compliance roles and fraud investigation tools ensured regulatory adherence and proactive risk management.
- Scalable Infrastructure:
The AWS-based architecture supports future growth, with Grafana and DOMO providing actionable insights for continuous improvement.
Conclusion
The Unified Payment Portal developed by Unibench represents a significant advancement in payment management technology. By combining a modern technology stack with user-centric features, the portal delivers a seamless, secure, and efficient experience for merchants, administrators, and compliance teams. This project showcases Unibench’s expertise in building scalable, innovative solutions tailored to the evolving needs of the fintech industry.
