American Express:
Mobile App Redesign
Project Overview:
This is a conceptual project looking to improve upon the experience of users of the American Express mobile app.
Project Objective:
Audit the existing application and perform a redesign of the app to improve usability and add any missing features to upgrade the overall UX, particularly looking to fully integrate AmEx savings accounts into the AmEx app.
My Role:
UX audit, user interview, competitive analysis, prototypes, user feedback.
Duration:
2 months (fall 2021)
Process:
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Research Define Design Test Review
Background
American Express began offering financial services to the American public in 1857. A century later, they began offering credit cards and is currently one of the largest credit card companies in the world. In addition to credit cards, AmEx also offers savings accounts, among other financial services. Currently, the mobile app is only for AmEx's credit card products. As someone who has both AmEx credit cards and an AmEx savings account, I would love to see the mobile app work for everything. As a result, this project audits the existing AmEx mobile application and aims to redesign the app to improve its current functionality as well as integrate the AmEx savings product into the app.
Research
UX Audit
The first step I completed was an audit of the existing American Express app. For the purposes of this project, I am focusing on the iOS app as that is what I currently have access to for researching purposes. I based my audit on Joe Natoli's UX Audit Workbook.
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Overall, the existing app does a lot of things well. As a real-life user, my only persistent gripe is the lack of usability for savings account holders. However, as I looked more in-depth, I noticed that the app has some potential issues with accessibility and there are a few changes that could be made to improve the ease of use and understanding.
User Interview
I set up an interview with a colleague, Sid, who is an avid American Express user to ask him some questions about his experiences using the current AmEx app. Overall, he is pleased with the app. It is easy to check balances and make credit card payments. He is even able to see the balances for his AmEx Savings account (something I am unable to do in my own AmEx account). However, there are two key issues he would like addressed in a redesign of the app.
First is related to savings accounts. While Sid is able to see the balance in his account, that is all that he can do. He would like to be able to do other banking tasks, such as transferring money or depositing checks, right from the app.
Second, he feels like AmEx is lacking some labelling in the app. Sid said, “If you have multiple cards, sometimes it's difficult to see which card you are on." AmEx relies on images of the particular card type for identifying your account when looking at the account home page. While the main page that shows all of your accounts lists the last four digits of the account number, the account home page does not have a number or name for the account. Sid has two different accounts that happen to be the same type of card. When he is looking at the account page, he has no way to know which of the two accounts he is in, except by looking at the account transactions. This is a major flaw in the app design. Sid would like to see a way to further differentiate the accounts, perhaps with different colors or customizable account nicknames.
Statistics
In order to validate the desire to integrate the AmEx Savings Accounts to the app, I looked into some statistics relevant to mobile banking. According to the Ipsos-Forbes Advisor U.S. Weekly Consumer Confidence Survey, in 2020, roughly three in four Americans (76%) used their primary bank’s mobile app at least one time throughout the year for everyday banking tasks, such as depositing checks or viewing statements and balances. Also according to Forbes, a 2019 FDIC survey found that 34% of consumers said that mobile banking was the primary way they accessed their bank accounts, beating out online banking (22.8%), bank tellers (21%), ATMs (19.5%) and telephone banking (2.4%). Given this information, it is reasonable to expect that American Express customers would appreciate being able to perform basic banking tasks on the mobile app, rather than needing to use online banking, the primary way they can currently access their accounts as there are no in-person locations. According to the American Express Savings FAQ, as read in October 2021, AmEx is currently testing out adding mobile banking as an option for Savings users, with no further information about when a widespread roll-out can be expected.
Competitive Analysis
I compared the current American Express app to other mobile banking and credit card apps, including Capital One, Citibank and Wells Fargo to see what features could be added to or changed in the AmEx app. Capital One and Citibank both integrate credit cards and banking into their mobile app. Capital One makes it easy to know which account the user is looking at. They also offer some settings options to change the look of the app. There is a cohesive look and feel between card accounts and bank accounts on these apps.
Meanwhile, Wells Fargo offers a robust mobile banking experience. It allows the user to view transactions, deposit checks, transfer funds, view statements, manage alerts, dispute transactions and more, all within the app. The AmEx app is very simple. Users are able to view transactions, view statements, and make payments.
AmEx is also lacking in help options compared to some of the other apps. While some have buttons that make locking a card or disputing a transaction simple, AmEx has a more obscure, unlabeled icon that takes users to a support page where there are some FAQs or the ability to chat with a representative. When a user is in need of help, there is a good chance that they will be in a heightened state, therefore, help should be obvious and easy to find. While none of the apps I looked at are perfect, there is definitely room for improvement in the American Express app based on other competitors on the market.
Define
Problem
American Express customers have limited options when using the mobile application. Those with savings accounts can not complete any transactions on the app. Additionally, while credit card customers can complete the necessary basic tasks on the app, some elements of the user interface are unnecessarily obscure and confusing. The American Express mobile app would greatly benefit from a redesign to integrate new features and make the app more accessible and user-friendly.
Goals
After completing the audit and additional research, the app redesign has the following goals:
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Integrate AmEx Savings into the current credit card app.
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Improve accessibility by updating colors to meet WCAG contrast standards.
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Change some of the icons to make them more understandable.
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Add labels to improve navigational understanding.
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Add options to allow users to customize the UI to fit their needs.
Design
Prototyping
In the design phase of this project, I jumped right to prototyping. I did not wish to completely change the look and feel of the existing app, so I have the current design to build from. The research phase also resulted in a solid list of changes I wish to make to the app, so I did not feel the need to do additional ideating. For this project, I focused on updating the main menu page, and a credit card account home page, as these two pages needed the most major content changes. I also added an app settings overlay for the main menu and a savings account home page.
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Left: Existing app
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Below: Redesign
User Feedback
Test
With the prototypes completed, I met with my colleague Sid again to show him what I had done. Overall, he was pleased with the results, saying "Great improvement! It's nice seeing that everything is in one place. This version of the app looks much more user friendly." He was happy to see the integration of savings accounts and was most excited about the customizable account nickname feature that would allow him to give each card a name if he wanted. Sid did have questions about the App Settings overlay I added. He wondered how this is different from the account settings pages that each individual account has. This is something that I can imagine possibly confusing some users, but I still think is valuable to add. Perhaps I need another way to inform users that these settings are will apply across the entire application, regardless of which account the user is looking at?
Review
As this project comes to an end, I am pleased with how I achieved the goals I set out to complete. While I did not tackle the entire American Express mobile application, I did update the two pages with the most perceived issues, as well as added two new screens that had been noticeably missing. To expand on this project in the future, I could look more closely at some of the other account screens; I could also look into other AmEx products and see how they could be integrated into app. There is always more that can be done, but I am confident that my redesign has made the app more user-friendly and accessible.
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Lessons Learned:​
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User interviews are a great way to learn about specific issues that need to be addressed that the researcher/designer may not think of themselves.​
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This is the first project where I've spent a lot of time considering WCAG accessibility standards, particularly color contrast. The colors of the original app did not always pass the tests, so I needed to change up the colors to pass while maintaining the original look and feel of the app.
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Joe Natoli's UX Audit Workbook included a lot of details I would not have thought to consider before this project. Completing an audit and redesign has taught me how to look more critically at existing products, which will continually help me on my journey to becoming a better UX designer.
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Thank you!
Please contact me with any questions or comments.