While the COVID pandemic decimated the world economy and livelihoods, it did for one positive light the proverbial firecracker under many industries, forcing digital transform and innovation. Banking and finance are certainly amoung the top benefactors in this regard - while business initially took a knock, it recovered quickly by moving interactions to digital channels. It is against this backdrop that contactless cash withdrawals became a necessity and we at the Absa Africa mobile app team had to ask ourselves “how might we enable customers to safely and conveniently withdraw cash so that they avoid infection risk (and contact with high-traffic surfaces physical branches)?”.
My Contribution
Creative Director, Design Project Lead
I consulted with and advised stakeholders, conceptualised the solution, lead/ directed the design and built the prototype.
Exploration
Initial suggestions from stakeholders were that a customer should be able to set up and “create” their withdrawal on the app before heading to the ATM. I felt this added unnecessary complexity and cognitive load. I felt the end-to-end process could be quick enough for a pre-setup to be redundant.
Considerations
Customers had to be able to access the ATM withdrawal feature near-instantaneously, on app launch, pre-login. Access had to be quicker than reaching for a bank card in a wallet.
The feature had to work in multiple currencies and countries.
The app needs to be aware of the denomination available in the ATM. We can’t let customers find themselves in a situation where the amount they enter is not available.
ATMs may be outdoors in bright sunlight, so we have to design for high-visibility.
The entire flow on the app needed to be tap only - I did not want customers to need to perform any keyboard inputs, like having to type an amount. Customers are in a public space and might be in a queue. Typing on a mobile device is fiddly, time-consuming, and prone to input errors.
We need to avoid the customer having to monitor both their mobile phone screen as well as the ATM screen - the app needs to relay all the necessary information and prompt the customer when to look at the ATM screen, if at all. The app, in other words, needs to relay all information to the customer, including when they can take their cash.
The final abriged (positive) flow, based on the existing mobile app conventions, components and the Absa illustration library, however some custom components and templates were built to cater for this specific use case.
Result
A key feature was to introduce the "quick cash" options. These are the same amount options that would be available on the ATM. We needed the ATM's QR code to be dynamic, refreshing every 90 seconds. This was done firstly for security reasons - so that customers would have to be on location when performing a withdrawal. Secondly, we needed the QR code to relay realtime information about the ATM and the available denomination.
We used this information to generate the "quick cash" options, enabling customer to set up the withdrawal amount with a single tap, and ensuring the input amount is available.
