Empowering New-to-Bank Customers: A UX Case Study on Seamless Loans at Checkout
Introduction
In the ever-evolving world of fintech, India’s financial landscape has witnessed a rapid transformation, empowering millions with digital solutions and innovative services. Among the diverse offerings, loans play a crucial role in providing individuals with the means to fulfill their aspirations and financial goals. However, for new-to-bank customers, accessing loans seamlessly has been a challenge, often involving cumbersome processes and prolonged waiting times.
According to a survey conducted by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in 2019, only about 3.3% of the adult population in India had credit cards. This indicates that the majority of the population, over 96%, did not possess credit cards at that time.
In tier 2 and tier 3 cities in India, affordability problems among the population can significantly impact merchants’ ability to grow their business. These affordability issues stem from various socioeconomic factors that restrict consumer spending power and, consequently, affect merchants’ revenue and growth prospects.
What we are solving…
We are addressing the challenge of limited credit accessibility for a significant portion of the Indian population. With the rapid transformation of internet and mobile ecosystems, commerce is evolving, and the usage of credit instruments is on the rise.
Our goal is to empower the next 300 million shoppers by enabling credit access for high ticket purchases in both online and offline shopping experiences. By bridging this credit gap, we aim to open doors to a broader customer base, unlocking new growth opportunities for businesses and enhancing the overall shopping experience for millions of Indians. Through innovative solutions and a customer-centric approach, we seek to foster financial inclusivity and drive economic progress, transforming the way people shop and transact in the digital era.
My contribution and goal
My primary goal was to enhance the overall user experience for both existing and potential customers, ensuring that they can easily access credit and make high ticket online purchases anytime-anywhere.
I played a significant role in updating the KYC (Know Your Customer) and repayment set-up journey, a critical step for loan approval. This involved creating seamless and user-friendly flows for different KYC types, such as Digilocker, C-KYC, and manual KYC. I focused on providing proper education and guidance to ensure even users with limited digital literacy can easily navigate through the process. Similarly, repayment set-up can be tougher if you don’t have a e-NACH enabled bank, as you have do a paper NACH. So segregated these flows with proper education for the end users for easy understanding and completion of the process.
Given that digital loans were relatively new, understanding the user’s perspective and keeping up with the latest RBI regulations were crucial aspects of my work. So, I played a key role in updating the flow with small yet impactful incremental changes and the flow simple and intuitive.
Impact
Our new merchant onboarding led to remarkable growth in loan completions. From only 10 loans a month at checkout with, we now successfully close over 100 loans per month.
As people are learning more about digital loans, adoption rate will gradually increase.
Designs decisions
Crucial design focus: Providing a native experience that seamlessly integrates with our merchants’ themes, ensuring UI coherence and a consistent look and feel across the platform.
Current scenario
Our product has successfully addressed numerous cases, and we are on a positive trajectory with our current journey. As part of our continuous improvement efforts, I collaborate closely with PMs and users to identify any existing flaws and devise strategies for streamlining the flow, ultimately boosting our adoption rate.
Currently, I am focused on revamping the entire journey to ensure a shorter, seamless and intuitive flow, aiming for a unified user experience across all our products.
Also, working closely with our talented illustrators, to create illustrations for various scenarios to add a delightful factor. The illustrations are designed to be self-explanatory, enhancing user understanding and engagement.
