2024
B2B
Background
Coronation Merchant Bank (CMB) is a leading financial institution serving corporate and institutional clients. Many of these clients manage thousands of customer transactions every month deposits, transfers, and reconciliations that were becoming increasingly difficult to track using the existing internet banking platform.
CMB needed a secure, responsive, and intuitive virtual account management system that integrated directly into their existing internet banking platform to reduce manual processes and giving clients real-time control over their finances.
My Role
I joined the project as the Lead UX/UI Designer, working within an Agile product team comprising:
1 Product Owner
3 Software Engineers
1 Scrum Master
1 QA Engineer
I was responsible for defining the design direction, driving user research, crafting prototypes, and ensuring that the user experience aligned with both client needs and banking compliance standards.
Tools
Figma
Duration
6 Weeks (September - October 2024)
How might we empower corporate clients to efficiently manage multiple customer accounts securely and without friction within an existing banking platform?
“It’s hard to track transactions across all our customers.”
“We need better visibility into cash inflows and outflows.”
“Creating sub-accounts manually is slow and error-prone.”
The current platform lacked scalability and flexibility, forcing many clients to manage transactions offline increasing operational delays and risk.
Observed Pain Points
CMB’s legacy internet banking system was not built to support such scale or customization. Clients were forced to manage transactions outside the platform, increasing risk, manual effort, and operational delays.
Understanding the Challenge
We kicked off the project with a 2-weeks discovery sprint focused on understanding the users and the system’s technical constraints. I conducted:
One insight that stood out: users were already creating makeshift “virtual accounts” offline using spreadsheets, then manually reconciling them with CMB’s statement exports, a slow, error-prone process..
This validated the need and urgency for an intuitive, secure virtual account feature within the bank's core internet banking experience.
After mapping out key pain points and goals, I translated our findings into user needs and functional priorities:
We explored multiple design directions through sketches, wireframes, and clickable prototypes. Each iteration was usability-tested with real users to validate assumptions.
Early Concepts
I began with low-fidelity sketches mapping different dashboard layouts, account creation flows, and transaction filtering patterns to visualize different information flows:
Dashboard with account overview
Quick-create flow for new virtual accounts
Transaction-level detail drill-downs
We ran iterative usability tests on the portal’s main screens. Here’s how specific improvements evolved:
Users preferred seeing real-time balances per virtual account upfront
A step-by-step “Create Virtual Account” wizard was more intuitive than a single long form
Users needed flexible transaction filters (by account, date range, amount, customer reference)
One insight that stood out: users were already creating makeshift “virtual accounts” offline using spreadsheets, then manually reconciling them with CMB’s statement exports, a slow, error-prone process..
We delivered a secure, responsive web interface integrated with the CMB internet banking platform that includes the key features below:
Easily manage and create accounts in minutes with custom rules
At-a-glance summary of balances and activities
Advanced filtering and search
In-app notification alert
Optimized for desktop and tablet
Early and frequent usability testing proved to be crucial in identifying and eliminating user pain points before development.
Through this project, we learned how to strike a balance between security features and ease of use, ensuring that corporate clients felt both safe and empowered when using the system.
Iterating through multiple design concepts, gathering feedback, and refining them based on user needs ensured that the final product met client expectations.
PayByCoronation transformed a manual, high-effort process into a secure, intuitive, and scalable solution that empowered corporate clients and strengthened CMB’s digital offering.
It reinforced my belief that even in compliance-heavy industries, user-centered design can deliver measurable business impact while delighting users.