Helping SMEs grow with Savings Pots
Year
2024
Device
Mobile and Desktop
Team
Product Manger, Design Lead, Business Analysts, Developers, Stakeholders
About Zempler Bank
Zempler Bank (formerly Cashplus Bank) is a UK-based fintech company providing banking solutions tailored for Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
About Savings Pot
The original ‘Pots’ feature was launch in October 2023 . The ‘Savings Pot’ was introduced with attractive interest rates to allow the business customers to grow their funds while setting aside money for specific purposes, staying organised, and managing finances efficiently.
My role
As a product designer, my goal was to enhance the Pots journey by adding interest features while keeping the experience simple and intuitive. With valuable research from the MVP Pots release, I focused on building upon the existing journey to improve usability and meet user needs.
Impact
Savings Pot feature was launched in January 2024 which significantly contributed to Zempler Bank's financial growth. In the financial year 2023-24, Zempler reported record revenues of £70 million, a 35% year-on-year increase, and a pre-tax profit of £3.3 million. The key figures from the report are as follows:
66%
users actively adopted the feature which was more than Pots
Hightlights
35%
increase in revenue compared to the prior year.
£2M
deposits till in first 3 months
The problem
Survey data and feedback from the Pots release revealed a key challenge—businesses wanted to earn interest while keeping funds organised. Many were transferring money to separate bank accounts to maximise returns, creating inefficiencies and increasing the risk of churn.
The demand for Savings Pot was clear—businesses needed a seamless way to grow funds within the platform. The challenge was to integrate interest-earning capabilities while balancing compliance, user expectations, and market demands. To ensure a timely release, we prioritised launching a single Savings Pot first, laying the groundwork for future enhancements.
The goal
We commenced planning while working on Pots, as Savings Pot extended its journey. While some tasks differed, pre-planning was critical. Our goal was to empower customers by enabling them to earn interest on funds. The initial phase introduced a single Savings Pot per customer, setting the foundation for future enhancements like creating multiple Savings Pots, supporting business growth and financial flexibility.
How we brought the vision to life
User research
With the initial survey and feedback from the Pots release, we identified a strong demand for Savings Pot. To gain deeper insights, we researched customer savings patterns, preferences, and product knowledge, especially considering similar products in the market. To achieve this, we conducted interviews with a focused group of customers, including business owners and accountants. These discussions helped us uncover the specific tasks customers required from Savings Pot beyond earning interest, as it became a top-requested feature that enhanced satisfaction, retention, and deposits.
Key Insights
The interviews revealed that many customers were transferring money to separate accounts to earn interest. 92% expressed a desire to view earned interest, and all participants wanted the ability to download transaction statements. These capabilities were essential for ensuring compliance and transparency, particularly for an interest-earning product.
Market research
We reviewed the competitors from the Pots and additional indirect competitors offering similar feature. Over time, the competitors’ journeys for Pots and Savings Pots had evolved, highlighting differences in design approaches. Our analysis centred on understanding these competitors, assessing the quality of their offerings, and reviewing how they communicated mandatory regulatory documents to meet compliance requirements. This helped us refine our communication strategy.
Defining problems and ideating solutions
The lean research approach and a well-defined problem statement made data analysis straightforward. Additional research allowed us to further refine the Pots persona, ensuring alignment with the problem statement and effectively guiding the design process.
To meet the business requirement for a timely release, we prioritised delivering the ability to create a single Savings Pot first. However, iterating on the user flow proved challenging, and new issues emerged during ideation, particularly with navigation throughout the journey.
I arranged workshop to discuss compliance requirements and identified the optimal points in the journey to communicate these to customers. We then mapped out the key user flow, ensuring a smooth experience. Due to the existing library I had created, transitioning to low-fidelity designs was seamless. As 85% of customers use mobile, I adopted a mobile-first approach to design, ensuring accessibility and ease of use.
Usability test results
The goal was to understand how users interacted with Pots and whether the journey met their saving needs. We wanted to ensure that all information was clear, upfront, and aligned with user expectations. Beyond this, it was important to evaluate the usability of the journey and explore how businesses might use the interest-earning Savings Pot.
To gain these insights, I conducted a prototype test. I focused on understanding how easily users could locate and comprehend information about earned interest, how intuitive the overall flow felt, and how businesses might leverage the Savings Pot.
Key findings
The test revealed key areas for improvement and unmet user expectations, including:
Users needed clarity on if any changes occurred in the interest rate.
Users wanted the ability to customise the statement date range, beyond the standard monthly statement download option was available,
Users wanted clarity regarding accrued interest if the Savings Pot was closed.
Refinements and updates
I compiled the findings into a report to shared with the team. Based on the feedback, I implemented the following refinements:
Addition of a ‘tag’ on the balance card to display the current interest paid and a ‘Total interest paid’ so far, making it easier for users to track and calculate their earnings.
Introduction of a new screen in the ‘Manage’ section with a summary box and access to the updated interest rate document.
A customisable date range for downloading Savings Pot and interest statements.
The information regarding the interest in the closing pot confirmation module.
These updates aimed to enhance clarity, usability, and flexibility, addressing key customer pain points and improving the overall user experience.
Visual design highlights
After addressing the initial usability issues, I refined the visuals further, conducted two more rounds of usability testing and ensured that all identified issues were resolved.
I led the entire UI design process, guided by key principles: prioritising user needs, ensuring consistency, simplifying navigation, and enhancing readability. Leveraging existing components from Pots made the process more efficient. I only needed to add variants of the interest table to the design system to accommodate the new functionality.
Streamlined Savings Pot creation
The process of creating Savings Pot is simple and intuitive. Users are introduced to the feature, view a summary box with key information, accept terms and conditions, and add funds (minimum £1). As only a single Savings Pot is supported, there’s no naming step, ensuring a seamless flow.
Savings Pot home screen
The home screen provides an overview of key actions and information, including the balance, current interest, total interest paid, transaction history, and an option to add or withdraw funds. In the Manage section, users can access essential documents (terms and conditions, summary box updates, interest statements, savings pot statements, and a certificate of interest for closed and active Savings Pots), guidance on how Savings Pots work, and an option to close the Savings Pot.
Interest, Close, and Archive
Users can view interest transactions and download statements with a customisable date range. Closing a Savings Pot transfers the balance to the main account and moves the Savings Pot to the archived section. Archived Savings Pots retain access to past transactions, ensuring transparency and easy review.
Bridging mobile and desktop with responsive design
I utilised existing design components created for Pots and added a variant for interest transactions and downloads. Responsive design was straightforward for Android due to scalable components, and I also adapted the designs for Online Banking.
Reflection
Designing Savings Pot helped me improve my understanding of the regulations around interest payments, including when and how they are added to accounts. I also gained valuable insights into how businesses make financial decisions to grow their funds and how a small behavioural detail, like showcasing total interest earned, can create an enjoyable and motivating experience for users. This experience reinforced the importance of aligning design with both compliance and user engagement to deliver value-driven solutions.
Next steps
While Savings Pot has been well-received, there’s always a room to grow. Customer feedback during research and usability test highlighted suggestions for future enhancements, such as locking Pots, automated contributions and pot to pot transfer of funds were noted for next phases of Pots and Savings Pot.
Guided by this demand, we have planned the development for Pots and Savings Pots in the next phase. User feedback remains central as we refine Pots to meet evolving needs, reinforcing the importance of user-centred design and iterative improvement.
After all, no product is ever truly finished!
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