Has this scenario played out for you or someone you know in the higher ed finance office?
A student gets a text message alerting them to a new bill. They open it — a victory. The new AI-enabled billing communications system has figured out when and on what device the student is most likely to engage. Perhaps LLMs are even helping personalize the message itself.
There’s just one problem — a family member paid that bill yesterday.
Because the communications platform is not deeply integrated with the institution’s SIS and financial systems, the AI is operating on stale data. The student panics and calls home. The parent calls the bursar’s office. Someone on your team is now pulled away from higher-value work simply to verify the account and reassure a frustrated family whose confidence in the payment process has now been shaken.
This is the difference between AI layered on top of disconnected systems versus AI embedded within a deeply integrated financial platform.
AI is only as good as the data feeding it
At Flywire, we believe AI in higher education finance must be grounded in real-time, authoritative data from the systems institutions already trust. That means communications, billing, payments, payment plans, and student account activity must operate together as a connected ecosystem — not as isolated tools stitched together after the fact.
Equally important, AI must be secure. Student financial and personal data cannot be exposed to public models or uncontrolled workflows. Flywire’s approach to AI is built with enterprise-grade security and governance at the core — protecting sensitive student data through strict access controls, secure infrastructure, responsible model usage, and tightly governed integrations designed to prevent data leakage and maintain institutional trust.
AI should reduce friction, improve confidence, and create better student and family experiences — not generate more confusion and support calls.
AI is only as good as the data feeding it
At Flywire, we believe AI in higher education finance must be grounded in real-time, authoritative data from the systems institutions already trust. That means communications, billing, payments, payment plans, and student account activity must operate together as a connected ecosystem — not as isolated tools stitched together after the fact.
Equally important, AI must be secure. Student financial and personal data cannot be exposed to public models or uncontrolled workflows. Flywire’s approach to AI is built with enterprise-grade security and governance at the core — protecting sensitive student data through strict access controls, secure infrastructure, responsible model usage, and tightly governed integrations designed to prevent data leakage and maintain institutional trust.
AI should reduce friction, improve confidence, and create better student and family experiences — not generate more confusion and support calls.
Why SIS integration is the key to AI ROI
AI ROI requires LLMs and AI-enabled tech to work with mission critical data to analyze and act. Without that connection, automation is just a quicker way to send, analyze, or at worst, act on incorrect information.
At Flywire, we’ve spent decades pouring the foundation that makes the "killer AI competency" possible. Because our Student Financial Software (SFS) is deeply integrated with the world’s leading SISs, transactions post automatically and in real time to ease the work of the finance team. This includes transactions for every type of student – domestic and international, for one-time payments, payment plan enrollment, or past-due balances.
The proof of value in this approach is in the numbers. Flywire SFS has helped institutions achieve ROI while improving student success metrics at scale, including:
- 908,000+ payment plans activated, expanding access and making education more affordable;
- $406M+ in past-due tuition collected, strengthening institutional cash flow;
- $81M+ in pre-collection savings, reducing hits to students’ credit and reliance on third-party agencies and minimizing fees;
198K+ at-risk student enrollments retained, representing 10x growth since 2020.
At Flywire, we’ve also embedded AI in our development methodology. We’re using AI tools to generate roughly 50% of the code, giving our engineering team a solid baseline to work with, deliver products faster, and move on to the next problem to solve. This enables us to quickly deliver new SFS functionality to better serve higher education institutions and students worldwide.
Clients are already seeing the benefits of faster development cycles in two critical areas where we’ve shipped new functionality: engagement and analytics.
- Flywire’s SFS Engagement Hub automates billing communications
Flywire automates billing reminders across email and SMS, with pre-built and configurable templates that enable the Student Account Office to proactively engage students and authorized users directly from the SFS system. Because it is built directly into the billing and payments workflow, balance information is always up to date.
Flywire’s SFS payment experience is launched directly from those messages, allowing students to easily enroll in payment plans and complete transactions on any device. This not only speeds on-time payments and helps increase cash flow, but also ensures transaction information is up-to-date in the institution’s SIS.
SFS Analytics Dashboard helps clients spot payment behaviors to clear roadblocks to revenue.
Beyond billing communication, accurate data is essential for analytics and access to real-time data on student payment behaviors. Flywire’s SFS Analytics provides institutions with insights and data visualizations to see and learn from trends over time. SFS clients are now able to easily drill into details about payments processed, payment plans, international payment trends, user activity and eRefunds. SFS Analytics charts and graphs offer insight into shifting student behaviors, assist in projecting cash flow, and aid in proactively identifying issues.
SFS Analytics also allows institutions to see details about their Collection Management activity, including placement dates, amounts, and resolutions, as well as collection plan activities and performance. This enables staff to quickly resolve past-due balances and get students back on track, which is the ultimate goal.
A scalable AI strategy for student finance
Without accurate, real-time data at every step in the billing process, there’s the potential to set in motion a number of errors that end up causing the student stress, and costing the school more time and money in the long-run.
In the end, a winning AI strategy as it relates to superior financial experiences must start with industry-leading integrations built on trusted processes that provide the highest levels of security and compliance. Today’s institutions can not afford to mask messy processes with another AI layer on top that does not deliver ROI.