CLAYFIN
What if the biggest risk in a banking app isn't security , it's confusion?
In India, 38% of banking users preferred Google Pay or Paytm over their own bank's app because every inconsistency in the interface created a moment of doubt. And in banking, doubt feels like risk.
I designed the retail digital banking experience for Clayfin's white-label platform so one system could feel simple for millennials and seniors, and still ship under multiple banks' brands and regulations.
Role
AI Product Designer
Timeline
4 weeks
Built with
Figma, Claude, Cursor
Platform
IOS
Context
A design decision here ships to hundreds of thousands of real users.
Clayfin builds white-label digital banking platforms for financial institutions. The product launched in India and later scaled across APAC, the Middle East, and Africa. I was the solo UI/UX designer at Neointeraction, embedded with Clayfin's product and engineering teams for the retail banking redesign.
SCOPE
Dashboard · Payments · Onboarding · Accounts · Design system
MARKETS
India (launched) · APAC · MENA · Africa (scaled)
CONSTRAINT
Every decision had to work across multiple banks' brands and regs.
The Problem
Bank apps lost trust one inconsistent screen at a time
By 2018–19, India's payment habit had already moved to third-party UPI apps (Google Pay, PhonePe, and Paytm) were winning on speed and clarity. Bank apps still owned the account, but they felt like a different product in every module.
The brief wasn't "add more features." It was: make the bank's own experience feel as trustworthy as the apps people already opened without thinking under RBI constraints, for millennials and seniors, on tablet and mobile.
67%
of millennials rated competitor interfaces more intuitive than traditional bank apps
60%
of 18–26 year old banking consumers used smartphones to interact with their bank
73%
of customers expect their bank to match the simplicity of apps they already used.
What We Found
Three root causes. All pointing to the same thing: users didn't trust the bank's own app.
Competitive analysis and stakeholder sessions with Clayfin and client banks surfaced three structural pain points that showed up across every traditional banking app we audited.
Inconsistent experience across every touchpoint
Navigation, visual language, and interaction models shifted between modules. Payments felt different from Accounts, which felt different from Settings.
Third-party apps had already won on trust
Google Pay and Paytm had years of simple, reliable interactions. 38% of users actively preferred them over their own bank's app. Clayfin had to match that trust baseline from scratch.
The app covered transactions, not financial lives
Users needed budgets, goals, and a unified view of money. The app gave them a ledger.
Key Insight
Trust is consistency, not a security badge.
In banking, a confusing layout reads as risk. It’s about one interaction language across pay, accounts, and settings so doubt never shows up mid-task.
Key Insight
The real product is the system that many banks inherit.
This wasn't one bank's app. It was a white-label platform. Components, flows, and hierarchy had to survive rebranding and regulation, not just look good in one demo.
Information Architecture
One map for pay, accounts, and the rest of the bank
How might we make a bank's own app as trusted and intuitive as the third-party apps users already prefer? The IA answered with three pillars off the dashboard: Menu, Payments, and Accounts so users never had to relearn where money lives.
Shared structure. Device-specific hierarchy on top.
Solution · Onboarding
Balance and recent activity lead
Stakeholder sessions kept returning to one first question: is my money okay? A feature-rich home created the same doubt that pushed people to Paytm.
OPTION A
Responsive scaling
· One layout, shrink to fit
· Faster to ship once
· Wrong hierarchy on both devices
OPTION B · CHOSEN
Context-first per device
· Tablet: review & overview first
· Mobile: quick pay & check balance
· Shared components, different task order
Solution · Accounts
A simple overview, then depth on demand
See every account at a glance, then open statements, deposits, cards, and linked details without changing the interaction language.
Seamless account experience
Solution · Personal finance
See spend in the same place as the money
Budgets and goals as a separate lifestyle silo would repeat the inconsistency problem. Spend insight had to sit next to the account.
OPTION A
Bolt-on finance features
· Separate PFM module
· Easy to scope as Phase 2
· Feels like another app inside the app
OPTION B · CHOSEN
Finance as a core layer
· Same cards, tables, and patterns
· One mental model for money
✓
Memories and Good Karma stayed light.
They were useful differentiators in the IA, but I only had singular screens for them — so this story keeps them secondary to dashboard, accounts, payments, and PFM.
Take control of your finances
What changed
The platform kept winning new banks, years after launch.
The 2018 retail work was an early chapter. Clayfin kept shipping the platform into new institutions — and later recognition followed the same product family.
34%
Active users at Bandhan Bank · 5,600+ outlets
151
nominations beaten to win IBSi's Best Digital Platform)
75+
Implementations across 25+ institutions by 2024
Reflection
Designing for one bank taught me what designing for thirty actually requires.
The competitive analysis and stakeholder research were shaped by India's market at launch. But the platform was always going to scale across APAC, MENA, and Africa.
I made design decisions grounded in one context and handed them to banks in very different ones. If I did this again, I'd build explicit cultural flexibility into the interaction patterns.
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Consistency is the trust layer. In banking, visual and interaction drift reads as risk.
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White-label work is systems work. The design system is the product banks inherit.
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Device context beats responsive sameness. Tablet review and mobile pay are different jobs.
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