Heritage Hub Federal Credit Union has deployed an AI-driven financial tool built with fintech Kiro Money to enhance its financial literacy offerings. 

Kiro Money aims to provide financial literacy to Americans who traditionally haven’t had access financial advice, Chief Executive Alisha Chowdhury told FinAi News.  

“Only 30% of Americans have access to an adviser, planner or coach, and that’s because it’s expensive,” she said. 

With Kiro Money, the Houston-based credit union’s clients have access to the Heritage Hub Money Coach, a chatbot housed within Heritage Hub’s member-facing portal, Chowdhury said. 

The tool, which launched Aug. 1, does not provide investment advice, but instead offers 24/7 access to financial coaching, Chowdhury said. It offers personalized budgeting advice — paying down debt, creating an emergency fund or planning milestone purchases — but won’t advise members on where to invest money.  

Using Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) technology, the tool pulls in member- and institution-specific data to offer unique responses to queries, Chowdhury said.  

“The assistant provides simple, personalized guidance in a format that is easy to access and understand,” Heritage Hub Federal Credit Union CEO Bolaji Ajimotokan told FinAi News. 

Developing Kiro

Kiro Money was founded in 2024, and has since raised $550,000 from investors including Founders Factory, Aviva Group and other angel investors, as well as a grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation.

Kiro’s building process included bringing in 40 financial experts to improve its model, Chowdhury said. The tool runs with several frontier AI models on the backend, alongside the RAG tech. 

The product also runs a guardrail agent for every query to monitor for unregulated investment advice, she said. 

The fintech’s clients include payments and AI automation platform Venderly and expense tracking platform CountedCare, according to Kiro. 

Heritage Hub Financial Credit Union is the first credit union live with Kiro Money, according to a July release. 

While Chowdhury did not disclose how much Heritage Hub spent on Kiro Money’s tool, she said the technology costs credit unions between $1,500 and $2,000 per month on average; prices depend on asset and member size. 

“AI can help us provide more accessible, personalized financial guidance while allowing us to remain competitive with larger financial institutions,” Ajimotokan told FinAi News. 

Register here for the FinAi Lending Summit, set for Oct. 7-8 in Las Vegas. This inaugural event will include speakers from Fifth Third and Capital One as well as a fireside chat with Piermont Bank founder and Chief Executive Wendy Cai-Lee.