Fintech Trends: Why One Flow Will Replace 40-Field Applications
Oct 9, 2025
Fintech Trends: Why One Flow Will Replace 40-Field Applications
The End of the 40-Field Form
There was a time when applying for a loan meant staring down a digital wall of boxes — name, address, SIN, income, employment, references, bank data — often repeated on multiple pages.
For most applicants, that’s the moment they drop off.
In an age where we can order food, rent apartments, and trade stocks with one tap, financial onboarding hasn’t kept up.
The 40-field form is the last relic of a paper-based era — and it’s finally disappearing.
The Shift to One Smart Flow
Modern fintech teams aren’t just digitizing forms — they’re rethinking the experience.
Instead of filling endless fields, users now complete one guided flow that captures, verifies, and evaluates data automatically.
Carousel calls this the “One Smart Flow.”
It’s a modular, embeddable system that runs ID, income, credit, and bank checks in parallel through integrations like Onfido, Flinks, Plaid, and Equifax — instantly feeding results into a unified decision engine.
We explored the foundations of this idea in How One Smart Flow Reinvents Fintech Onboarding and its execution across industries in One Smart Flow for Every Vertical: Lending, Leasing, Insurance.
Why Parallel Beats Sequential
Old systems still process data step-by-step: verify identity, then income, then credit, then wait for a manual review.
That means lost time and lost applicants.
Carousel runs all verifications simultaneously.
In practice, that means what once took 15 minutes now finishes in under 60 seconds — and applicants never see a “please wait” screen again.
This approach was discussed in Async Verification vs Real-Time Checks: Choosing the Right Flow, where async logic keeps applicants moving while verifications continue in the background.
The Business Impact
This transformation isn’t cosmetic — it’s measurable:
70% faster completion rates across lending and leasing workflows
50% fewer drop-offs from application friction
Higher conversion from pre-approval to funded deals
By consolidating all data collection into a single flow, Carousel helps lenders and insurers scale without increasing headcount.
The outcome is detailed in Underwriting 2.0: Using a Decision Engine to Approve Faster.
Security Without Compromise
Speed means nothing without security.
Every flow in Carousel is fully encrypted and compliant with KYC, AML, and data retention requirements — automatically creating an audit trail for regulators.
We break this down in Serious Security Built In: How Carousel Handles KYC, AML & Audit Trails.
That’s how fast doesn’t have to mean risky.
The Future of Fintech Onboarding
In the next decade, the question won’t be “How do we make onboarding faster?” — it’ll be “Why didn’t we automate it sooner?”
Fintechs that still rely on traditional forms will fall behind those using systems that think, verify, and decide in real time.
The One Smart Flow model isn’t just a convenience — it’s the new infrastructure for trust, compliance, and conversion.
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Internal References in This Article
One Smart Flow for Every Vertical: Lending, Leasing, Insurance
Async Verification vs Real-Time Checks: Choosing the Right Flow
Serious Security Built In: How Carousel Handles KYC, AML & Audit Trails