Best onboarding software for financial services teams

Best onboarding software for financial services teams

Summary

Navigating client onboarding in financial services has become increasingly complex. Business teams must juggle compliance checks, document reviews, and internal handoffs – while ensuring every step is completed accurately and efficiently.

But have you stopped to consider why it feels so burdensome?

The truth is, much of the administrative burden comes not from regulation itself, but from the systems your teams use to manage onboarding. Outdated tools, fragmented workflows, and manual processes are often the root cause.

And when these systems fall short, the risks are real:
Delayed onboarding, lost revenue, eroded client trust, and overwhelmed teams.

Therefore, the right onboarding software can make this essential stage of client management a lot more easier.

In this guide, we’ll walk you through some of the most effective onboarding tools available for financial services. You’ll learn how to evaluate your options, what features to prioritize, and how to build and run a seamless and compliant onboarding process without any more headache.

What is client onboarding in financial services?

Client onboarding in financial services is the initial process of engaging a new client by gathering required documentation, verifying identity, assessing risk, and setting up financial accounts or products. It ensures regulatory compliance and helps create a smooth and trusted start to the client relationship.

Regardless of the services your organization provides, client onboarding is the essential starting point for managing new relationships. Common scenarios include:

  • Onboarding high-net-worth individuals to a private bank
  • Setting up accounts for corporate or institutional investors
  • Registering regulated entities like insurance brokers or fintech platforms
  • Verifying beneficial ownership and financial standing

Optimizing this phase of client management is critical for business teams, as it must balance client expectations with complex regulatory and operational requirements.

Work in a compliant way with new clients

Much like onboarding for banking services, there are certain regulatory compliance requirements for most financial services platforms, and thus, especially when you choose to provide a digital onboarding experience to your clients, either to start accounts or register to a service, certain onboarding steps are taken, including:

Identity checks: Ensuring that the client is a legitimate legal entity or individual, typically through document checks, biometric authentication, or digital ID verification tools.

KYC (Know Your Customer): KYC is a process in which customers provide official confirmation about their identities and addresses to protect financial services providers from fraud, money laundering, and corruption.

AML (Anti Money-Laundering): AML is actually a KYC requirement to prevent money laundering, which is a process of transferring money through various accounts to cover up illegal activities.

When onboarding isn’t streamlined, these steps can become bottlenecks – slowing down revenue generation, frustrating clients, and exposing the organization to regulatory risk. Inefficiencies here aren’t just operational headaches; they can raise red flags during audits and damage long-term trust. 

Eliminate churn, onboarding delays, and administrative chaos

Financial clients expect a seamless experience, especially during onboarding. Delays caused by internal misalignment – such as repeated document requests, missed approvals, or lack of transparency can have a huge impact on client engagement before the relationship even begins.

From a business standpoint, poor onboarding drags out time-to-revenue and ties up operational resources.

From a compliance standpoint, it creates a paper trail of exposure.

A well-executed onboarding process doesn’t just check boxes – it sets the tone for a long-term, successful client relationship.

Why does onboarding software matter for Financial Services?

An onboarding software is a digital solution that helps financial services streamline and secure the end-to-end intake process with new clients. It enables teams to automate compliance workflows, collect documents securely, and collaborate internally – all without relying on spreadsheets, emails or manual processes.

What to look for in a client onboarding software

When selecting the ideal onboarding software for your business, you need to make sure that it’ll perfectly align to your business objectives and requirements. The right solution for you will always depend on your activity, your team, and how simple or advanced your onboarding flow needs to be.

So, here’s what I looked at when picking what I think are the most important features that help streamline your onboarding workflows:

Compliance-first workflows

A financial onboarding platform must be designed with compliance logic at its core. You should be able to map and launch routine onboarding workflows built with predefined rules according to your requirements.

Dynamic workflows should:

  • Trigger enhanced due diligence automatically for higher-risk clients
  • Route lower-risk profiles through streamlined processes
  • Include built-in audit trails that are secure, timestamped, and immutable

Without this automation, teams often fall back on spreadsheets, checklists, and emails – leading to delays and increased risk of human error.

Secure client data collection

Security is non-negotiable in financial services. Your onboarding software should offer:

  • Bank-grade encryption
  • Secure file transfers
  • Granular role-based access controls
  • A centralized client portal for document uploads, e-signatures, and status tracking

A well-designed portal removes the need for email exchanges and serves as a single source of truth throughout the onboarding journey.

Role-based collaboration for internal teams

Onboarding typically involves multiple departments – compliance, legal, sales, operations – each with its own tasks and timelines.

The right onboarding software you choose should support:

  • Role-based task assignments
  • Automated reminders and due dates
  • Approval routing and workflow tracking
  • Full visibility across teams with audit-ready records

This ensures smooth collaboration and helps every team implement compliance policies efficiently, without relying on manual oversight.

Frictionless onboarding experience

For clients, onboarding should be intuitive and efficient – not a frustrating administrative process.

A modern onboarding solution should allow you to:

  • Build a branded, user-friendly interface
  • Provide real-time progress updates and milestone tracking
  • Send automated reminders and deadline notifications
  • Support mobile access for convenience on the go

Integration capabilities

Your onboarding software should integrate easily with the rest of your tech stack – including CRM, core banking systems, document management tools, and compliance databases.

Look for solutions that offer:

  • Pre-built integrations with tools your teams already use
  • Open APIs to connect with internal systems or custom workflows
  • Webhooks and data sync features to reduce manual input and duplication

Robust integration capabilities ensure onboarding is not a siloed process, but part of a connected, end-to-end client lifecycle. 

How to evaluate an onboarding software

1. Quick Setup and customization

Look for solutions with pre-built financial templates that let you launch fast – no heavy development required.

2. Compliance & audit readiness

Ensure the platform offers secure document storage, action timestamping, and an automatic, immutable audit trail.

3. Scalability and support

Choose software that scales with your business and provides responsive, hands-on support – not just a generic help center.

4. Pricing transparency and total cost of ownership

Evaluate upfront costs, licensing models, and ongoing support fees to get a full picture of ROI.

Best onboarding platforms: 4 tools for Financial Services

Clustdoc: Best in class onboarding solution for Financial organizations

Yes, you’re probably expecting this – but honestly, if you’re looking for onboarding software that truly does it all and scales with your business, Clustdoc is the one we recommend without hesitation.

Clustdoc is purpose-built for compliance-driven client onboarding. Financial institutions use it to streamline document collection, automate logic-based workflows, and manage client interactions through a centralized platform.

Use Clustdoc when:

  • You onboard clients with varying compliance needs
  • You need full traceability, document control, and audit readiness
  • You want to orchestrate complex onboarding workflows without coding


Key features include:

– Branded, secure client portal with guided onboarding checklists, identity verification (IDV), e-signatures, file uploads, and status updates

– Built-in approval workflows, automated reminders, and GDPR-compliant data handling

– Centralized dashboard for client tracking, team collaboration, and real-time application progress

– API access, shared inbox, audit trails, and CRM integrations (including HubSpot, Pipedrive and more)

– Enterprise-grade security: SOC 2, GDPR

Pricing
– Pro plan: €190/month
– Expert and Ultimate plans: on quote

– 7 days free trial

Process Street: Best for simple, repeatable onboarding checklists

Process Street is a solid choice for firms that need to manage recurring, task-based onboarding through easy-to-build checklists. While not built specifically for financial services, it excels in internal operations and process standardization.

Use Process Street when:

  • You need to build recurring onboarding checklists
  • You’re handling internal operational workflows

Features
– Unlimited workflows, tasks, forms, conditional logic, approvals, dynamic due dates, permissions, and analytics dashboard
 – Integrates with Slack, Zapier, Power Automate, AD, and offers mobile apps
 – Enterprise-grade security: SOC 2, HIPAA, SAML/SCIM

Pricing
To get any information on Process Street pricing you’ll have to contact their sales team.

Jotform Approvals: perfect for form-based client onboarding

Jotform Approvals is ideal for small firms, fintechs, or consultants looking for a lightweight way to collect client information and approvals via forms. It’s intuitive and quick to deploy, but not built for multi-stakeholder collaboration or complex onboarding logic.

Use Jotform Approvals when:

  • You handle onboarding primarily through forms
  • You don’t need deep compliance features or workflow complexity

Key Features

– Drag-and-drop form builder with approval routing, conditional logic, group approvals, and email alerts

– Mobile-friendly access via Jotform Inbox and Tables

– No-code automation with unlimited workflows (even on the free plan)

Pricing

  • Free: 5 forms, 100 submissions/month, 100 MB storage (Jotform branding)
  • Bronze: $34/month – 25 forms, 1,000 submissions, 1 GB
  • Silver: $39/month – 50 forms, 2,500 submissions, 10 GB
  • Gold: $99/month – 100 forms, 10,000 submissions, 100 GB, HIPAA-ready
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

Zoho Creator: Ideal for custom-built onboarding apps

Zoho Creator is a low-code platform that gives you full control over onboarding logic, interface, and integration. It’s well-suited for financial teams with in-house technical expertise who want to create highly tailored onboarding applications. However, it comes with a steeper learning curve and longer deployment time.

Use Zoho Creator when:

– You want to customize every part of the onboarding flow

– You have technical resources and time for setup


Features
– Low-code builder for forms, reports, dashboards, AI workflows, and mobile-ready apps
– Enterprise edition includes custom branding, mobile app customization, and up to 30 data sources
– Built-in audit trails, backup, and version control


Pricing
– Free: 1 user, 1 app, 250 MB storage, 1 000 records
 – Standard: $8/user/mo
 – Professional: $20/user/mo
 – Enterprise: $25/user/mo

How to create a digital onboarding process for Financial Services (with Clustdoc)

Step 1 – Create your digital onboarding checklist

Build a client-facing checklist that includes uploads for IDs, legal forms, UBO declarations, and signed agreements.

Building client onboarding process

Step 2 – Automate your workflow

Assign tasks to internal reviewers, set automated triggers for risk-based flows, and minimize manual follow-up.

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Step 3 – Invite clients and review submissions

Clients access a secure portal with clear guidance. Staff receive real-time visibility into submission status and can approve or reject instantly.

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Bonus – Track progress and maintain an audit trail

Use dashboards to track onboarding completion, send reminders, and ensure every action is logged for compliance reviews.

Screenshot 2025 04 07 at 10.30.33

Get to know Clustdoc

Clustdoc is a professional Client Onboarding and Verification Software.

Many teams use Clustdoc to orchestrate, run and manage repeated industry-specific onboarding workflows with clients or stakeholders:

– Automate routine workflows – no more paper documents
– Get rid of manual tasks and decrease approval lag time
– Stop chasing data and files across multiple tools
– Improve customer engagement and satisfaction

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Marie

Marie is the voice of the customer at Clustdoc, she loves guiding businesses toward clarity in their processes and client interactions for better performance and peace of mind.

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