Designing and Developing Mobile Banking for a Fintech Startup

Leading UX and Front-end Dev team for a Digital Banking Startup, I transformed a struggling MVP into a successful Fintech platform in Bangladesh. Working with a cross-functional team, I designed the entire payment experience from ground up, delivering a market-ready solution in just 3 months, achieving 40% increased user satisfaction.

Two smartphones displaying a digital payment app with options for sending and requesting money, transaction history, and contact icons on a light background.

Year (Duration)
2018 (3 months)

My Contribution
Leading the UX and Front-end

My Role
Lead Designer & Dev

Key Actions
Research, UX Design, Testing

Challenges

JustPay, a promising fintech startup, was at a critical juncture with a flawed MVP that failed to meet market needs. The platform needed a complete redesign to establish itself in Bangladesh's competitive digital banking space.

Transform a problematic MVP into a user-friendly fintech platform
Design intuitive banking workflows while meeting regulatory requirements
Create a scalable solution that could be developed rapidly

Kickoff & Usability Testing

With a struggling MVP and critical time constraints, I facilitated strategic workshops with stakeholders to realign our vision and set clear priorities.

Collaborated with business teams to identify critical features needed for market viability and regulatory compliance in digital banking.
Identified two key user segments requiring distinct solutions:
- Young professionals needing quick digital payments
- Small businesses seeking efficient transaction tools

Initial Assessment - Usability Testing

Before diving into design solutions, we conducted a critical evaluation of the existing MVP through usability testing with 10 internal and external users.

Key Findings

Complex registration process causing 70% drop-off
Confusing transaction flows leading to user errors
Inconsistent navigation patterns
Missing crucial payment confirmations

These insights helped stakeholders understand the urgency of our redesign and informed our initial design priorities.

User Research

Following our initial assessment, we conducted in-depth research to understand payment behaviors and banking needs. Through 10 user interviews across different age groups and digital literacy levels, we identified key patterns in digital payment usage. Our findings:

Users need quick access to frequent payment options
First-time users need clear guidance through transactions
Users need instant confirmation and transaction history
Users need to feel secure during financial transactions
Users want to track spending patterns easily

Information Architecture

After analyzing user needs, we structured the app to provide quick access to essential banking functions while maintaining a clear hierarchy for less frequent tasks.

Core Structure

Home: Frequently used payment options and account overview
Payments: Categorized by type (Send, Request, Bills, Merchant)
History: Detailed transaction records with smart filters
Profile: Account settings and preferences

Through card sorting sessions with 6 users, we validated our structural decisions:

Quick actions positioned prominently on home screen
Payment types grouped by user mental models
Transaction history organized by recency and type
Settings categorized by usage frequency

A flowchart diagram titled 'Connect Agent Tasks' outlining tasks related to Account Management, Payment, Deposit, Withdrawal, Task Queue, Reports, and Transfer, each with detailed sub-tasks and steps.

Customer Journey & Fish-bone Mapping

Our dual analysis approach - Customer Journey Mapping and Fishbone Diagrams - helped identify critical pain points in the payment process. This revealed how technology, design, and process issues contributed to user frustration, guiding our redesign priorities.

Flowchart diagram titled 'Transfer (NOSmartPhone)'. It shows steps, titles, and emotional journey for a transfer process involving an agent and customer. The chart includes color-coded boxes, a line graph with smiley face icons tracking emotional states, and guidance for various stages.

Flowcharts illustrating the process steps for Money Transfer, Bill Payment, and Top Up transactions with color-coded branches for PIN, biometric authentication, account selection, and status updates.

Wireframes

We designed low-fidelity solutions focusing on quick payments, bill payments, and money transfers. This helped refine our approach to confirmation steps and transaction feedback, ensuring clarity in critical payment flows.

User Flow

I created specialized flows for customers (focused on quick payments) and agents (optimized for cash operations).

Flowchart diagram illustrating steps for a transfer process, including screens for customer type selection, QR code scanning, entering customer and receiver information, specifying transfer amount, selecting receiver type, and provider.

Screenshots of a mobile banking app displaying various features, including sending money, creating instructions, checking account statements, viewing electricity bills, requesting funds, and transaction history.

Final Solution

1st Iteration of Design

Our initial design iteration tackled the core payment experience. We focused on a clean dashboard with quick actions and simplified transaction form.

Screenshots of a mobile banking app showing account balance, transaction history, transfer screens, and menu options.

2nd Iteration

Building on insights from our first iteration testing, we refined interfaces to optimize user interactions. For customers, we improved their home page, with clearer transaction feedback with clearer status indicators, while simplifying the payment flow to require fewer taps.

Screenshots of a mobile banking app showing account balance, transaction history, and options to send money to different contacts.

Annotated screenshot of a mobile banking app showing a 'Send Money to' screen with features such as recent contacts, contact list, and tabbed menu at the bottom, with descriptive notes about the interface.

Mobile app screen showing a list of bank accounts with their balances, highlighting account end numbers and balance amounts, with annotations explaining that the balance display is only active for accounts with previously inputed balance.

Impact & Looking Ahead

Our three-month redesign transformed JustPay from a struggling MVP into a viable fintech platform. The rapid turnaround saved critical business momentum while demonstrating the power of focused, user-centered design.

Key achievements include launching a stable platform within tight deadlines, achieving 95% task success rates, and establishing a loyal user base. The streamlined payment experience significantly improved user satisfaction and transaction completion rates.

For JustPay's continued growth, we identified three key opportunities: