Definition
An AISP (Account Information Service Provider) is an authorised provider that reads your bank accounts — balances and transactions — with your consent, in order to present them somewhere else.
It looks, it does not act: no payment or change is possible on your accounts.
AISP vs PISP: don't confuse them
Two distinct PSD2 roles, often combined in a single app but with different authorisations:
- AISP — read-only: it consults your accounts to display, aggregate and analyse.
- PISP — payment initiation: it triggers a credit transfer from your account, without going through the card.
An AISP that also wants to trigger transfers must obtain the PISP authorisation separately.
What an AISP can do
- Aggregate several accounts from several banks into a single view.
- Present history, balances and transaction categorisation.
- Refresh the data within the limits of consent (regular renewal required by the PSD2 RTS).
What an AISP cannot do
- Initiate a payment from your account: that is the PISP's role.
- Access the data without the PSU's explicit consent, nor beyond the consented scope.
- Operate without an authorisation (in France, ACPR / PSP register) or without the technical safeguards — eIDAS certificates, mTLS — required by the banks.
In the PSD2 ecosystem
The AISP is a TPP (third-party provider) just like the PISP or the CBPII, but with a scope strictly limited to reading. The PSU gives their consent, the ASPSP exposes the data through secure APIs, and the AISP connects to them within the regulated framework.
Concrete examples
- Individual — aggregation and budgeting: Bankin', Linxo or Lydia connect to all your banks to show a unified budget, categorise spending and warn you of an overdraft. They read, they don't move the money.
- Business — invoicing and accounting: Pennylane, Qonto or Indy automatically retrieve the bank entries to reconcile them with invoices, feed the accounting and prepare VAT. No more manual CSV exports.
- Lender — credit scoring: Algoan or Bridge analyse the account history to assess creditworthiness in a few seconds, complementing (or replacing) payslips.