Software Testing in the banking industry is an important exercise performed to accommodate and reflect operational changes. Given the surge in use of banking applications and technology, the industry is dependent on testing. While manual testing is still required to test the application before it goes live, automated testing helps reduce time to market and improves the quality of the application in the production stage.

While automated testing tools make testing easier, they come with their own set of challenges. Test Automation projects require unique scripting skills that testers sometimes lack. The most demanding phase of an automation project is the initial stage when tools are set up and test scripts are written.

Even when an automated Testing Solution is implemented, chances of failure often frustrate banks. This is mainly because of the flawed implementation of the solution or investments in automation failing to deliver on their promise.

Let us look at other reasons why a bank’s software test automation project fails:

1. Automation testing requires special programming skills

Testing an automation software solution requires unique programming skills and most testers come with domain and application knowledge. Consequently, they struggle with testing automated software. The solution is to use a script-less automated testing software for better efficiency.

2. Timely reflection of changes

Another reason for automation projects to fail is that the changes, be it by the regulatory authority or product updates take too much time to reflect on the bank’s system as well as the third-party systems.

3. Underestimating the complexity of the automated testing tool

Most automation tools are tested to handle simple cases with 5 or 10 screen workflows. When it comes to a banking solution, there could be over 5,000 screens with over 50,000 fields. This could be challenging for even the best automation solution. It could further lead to wrong ROI calculations and pose some serious technical challenges while dealing with different technologies of the bank’s underlying applications.

4. Inflexibility in testing

Factors such as dual authentication can be frustrating in the testing activity. Not solving this issue can be one of the primary reasons why a bank’s software testing automation project fails.

5. Use of various technologies

Most banks have diverse applications in use, on various technologies. Accommodating changes on all the user interfaces and APIs requires handling multiple UI types –web, desktop, and mainframes. Failure to do so could mean failure of the automation project.

6. Choosing a wrong protocol to automate

While planning an automated testing activity, one must plan the testing activity and the test process efficiently to see which is the process that needs manual testing and which ones could be automated. Any wrong move in planning can result in failure of the automation testing project.

7. Not being able to reuse the testing solution

As a testing solution has a higher initial cost, banks must plan in such a way that the same testing solution can be used for multiple functions and must be easy to navigate.

8. Having no validation

A testing solution must make room for validation—validating the software at the end of the development process to see if the software meets the expectations and requirements. In the banking domain, the testing solution must be able to test loan schedules, interest charged, charges, accounting entries, exchange rates, messages, and client communications.

Failure to do so could cause the automation project to fail. It all boils down to this—plan proactively and do not underestimate the tool, the deadline, and the resources to ensure the success of the testing project.

A script-less easy-to-use automation solution can help banks meet their testing needs. The Tenjin Automation Suite makes uninterrupted banking operations a possibility.

Learn more about Tenjin here