DEBT NAVIGATOR
Loan management platform that helps customers to rethink mortgages to achieve financial freedom faster
AUCKLAND, NZ | 2021
BACKGROUND
New Zealand Home Loans (NZHL) helps New Zealanders to manage their mortgage loans. Over the last 25 years, the business grew into a nationwide network, saving its clients billions of dollars.
NZHL suggested that their user experience was a bit behind the times. They were operating on legacy platforms and missing opportunities in streamlining processes and automation.
MY ROLE
I led design in the research & discovery team, as well as handing over the production-ready design to the delivery partner.
SOLUTION
The project's goal was to upgrade the existing product and provide accurate and reliable data to clients at all stages of their customer experience.
RESULTS
I redesigned the mortgage management platform, which resulted in:
- Mortgage advisors’ productivity increased by 17%.
- Avg task completion rate increased by 34%.
- Avg task time decreased by 36%.
The production-ready design has been handed over to a delivery partner.
2x Gold Award winner in the Indigo Design Awards for digital tools and interaction. Bronze winner for interface and navigation.
UNDERSTANDING THE USERS
During the discovery sessions, we revealed that there were multiple core users of the product:
- Mew business consultants, who primarily drive sales.
- Advisors, who lead the process and foster the continuity of care;
- First-home buyers who seek guidance in the purchasing process;
- Refinance seekers, who are the key segment for NZHL;
- Property investors.
These users would interact with the product differently depending on their knowledge, mortgage lifetime, and personal goals.
IDEATION AND CONCEPTS
Within the next couple of weeks, we shared initial concepts with key business owners and the initial set of end-users. We tweaked functionality based on research insights and the platform's technical limitations.
USABILITY TESTS
Once we had enough clarity on the app's structure and overall direction, we conducted thorough user research with several groups divided by segments, location, and demography. We then used simple prototypes in Figma to check the interface logic.
FINAL DESIGN
The product features include historical balance data and visualising loan structure to allow users to quickly see their performance and get valuable insights from their daily habits. We've implemented daily transaction tracking based on OpenBanking APIs from major banks. With this data, advisors could create tailored advice with the possibility of automation in the future.
KEY CHALLENGES
We were unable to change certain business processes to improve the user experience for our customers due to the product's complex legacy backend. However, we were able to redesign some aspects to address user experience issues that were not related to the backend logic.
This project, including usability testing, was completed remotely. I worked from London while the rest of the team was in New Zealand, with an 11-hour time difference between us. I dedicated my weekends to this project, and we also had sync meetings in the evenings during the weekdays.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Working in a large, old-fashioned company requires great patience, an understanding of the environment, and a strategy for achieving change.
I gained valuable experience working in a highly distanced team and reaffirmed that designing end-to-end digital services remotely is possible.
THANK YOU!