Design Thinking Exercise

Whole Bank Travel Payment Feature

Whole Bank is a traditional local banck in Massachusetts who want to innovate in the way the do business, developing a more technological and user-friendly strategy.

They want to start doing so by solving one of the problems their customers have when they travel abroad. They have found that some customers may benefit from a feature in their existing app that allows them to pay without their credit/debit cards when they travel.

One of the main problems I found in the interview process was that -because I lack the time to interview strangers- the people I asked the questions were close to me. It was hard to make some questions trying to keep it professional when they were friends or relatives. For example, I asked a friend if he had traveled abroad recently as I asked the rest of the people I inverviewed but I already knew the answer because we traveled to the UK in August together.

Also, it was hard to make the same questions to all the users because the answers where so different. For instance, when they have traveled abroad, I could asked them wheather they had problems with the currency or their credit cards but if they had never traveled, I had to ask them another set of questions I had prepared, more related to the mobile payment or credit cards in general.

Another problem was that, as many of my friends are computer science engineers, they tend to give advice in the app and they have too much knowledge so they are not the best users to test.

Also, as it can be seen in the list of things I got from the interviews, some people didn’t trust the mobile payment and preferred to use their credit cards as they didn’t find any problems with them. Some other people preferred that this feature was located as a different app. In this case, I would prefer to talk to the customer because maybe some things are susceptible of consideration in the model of inovation they propose. However, as I couldn’t, I asked the test users what things in the app would change their mind. I got that if the feature was easily accessed, they wouldn’t have many problems having the feature within the app. Also, if there were some kind of garanties in the mobile payment and some kind of warning telling them that their money is safe, they would feel more confortable with the type of payment. So, although I couldn’t have the conversation with the company, I got a lot of useful feedback from the users regarding those things that worried me.

NOTE: I have found that people, even though the bank provides a mobile payment, the NEED cash. So, as a future improvement, I would include a feature to withdraw cash in some commerces (something similiar as Twyp Cash, that allows customers to go, for example, to a gas station and use the app to get 25 pounds in cash from their account).

The main problem I am trying to solve is the easiness and usefulness of the mobile travel payment app. I have found that people don’t feel like the need the app and some of them feel like the feature in a bank software would be frustrating and difficult to find or use. Therefore, I will focus on adding features that would help them in their travel finances as they pay with the app. Some people told me they had problems in knowing the actual currency change in every exact time and that they would like to know in advance how much will it cost any purchase in the currency they are used to pay with, so I am adding a calculator as well as the actual currency change always in the top.

As they algo wanted for the feature to be easy to find, I am designing an icon in the fron page so they won’t have to search through the app to find it. I am taking into account, as well, the non-traveller users of the app so that it isn’t annoying.

Acording to the realiability, as I don’t have any tools to ensure it, I am including some information of the payments in the configuration step so the user feels safe.

One thing I have learned is that, yes, sometimes your product is not really necesary and the clients are not ready for it, but, sometimes, instead of changing your product, you can just adjust your original idea taking into account the users need and concerns and build something in the middle. I tend to think that if your product is not very well received in the market, you have to change it but, sometimes, is just the perception of the product that casuses rejection not the product itself and just by chaging how people see the app or the service you are providing, you can change entirely how the market welcomes your product.

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