Dividend re-investment

My role

I led the UX design for the project, including:

• defining the interaction model

• designing flows and UI components

• collaborating with product and engineering teams

• translating financial rules into user-centred design patterns

Background

The problem

This project aims to provide a feature that encourages customers to reinvest any cash earned from dividends to retain the cash within the company. Dividend payments are a key part of many investment strategies, yet the existing reinvestment experience created confusion.

Users struggled to understand:

• when reinvestment would occur

• which holdings were eligible

• how dividends were calculated

• how changes impacted their portfolio

The interface surfaced complex financial information without sufficient context, leading to uncertainty and increased support queries.

Success metrics

These are the success metrics and criteria set for the project to make sure all ares were considered

User goals

Business goals

Constraints

• Increase adoption of dividend reinvestment

• Reduce customer support queries

• Improve transparency around dividend eligibility

• Explain the criteria required for dividend reinvestment

• Understand how reinvestment works

• Clearly see eligible holdings

• Make quick changes to reinvestment preferences

• The ability to view their dividends

• Financial compliance requirements

• Complex dividend calculation rules

• Legacy backend data structures

Research & discovery

The aim of the research was to

• To identify major user pain points with the existing web journey.

• To evaluate user understanding of DRIPs and their motivations with regards to them.

The discovery phase involved analysing customer support issues, reviewing internal documentation on dividend processes, and conducting moderated interviews of the current journey..

Key findings revealed:

• The feedback when the reinvestment settings were changed were unclear

• Eligibility rules were complex for inexperienced users

• Users struggled to find reinvestment page in the navigation

• Overall received a usability score of 84

Investors often relied on external resources to understand the feature.

This indicated a strong need for clear explanations and better visibility of dividend events.

How might we...

• …provide more clarity on dividend reinvestment eligibility?

• …provide multiple routes to the page for easier navigation?

• …provide clearer feedback that settings have been changed?

• ...provide a simpler process to reinvest dividends for bot seasoned and new users?

• ...breakdown the 'block of text' to be understood, so all users are aware of what dividend reinvestment is, and the fees included

Workflow assessment

A few competitors were analysed to understand how the mobile app concept was designed in the industry

Heuristic evaluation

Competitor analysis

The journey went through evaluation to ideate a clearer structure for dividend actions.

Concept exploration

Several interaction and navigation patterns were explored.

Key improvements included:

• Visible feedback notifications when reinvestment settings are changed

• clearer eligibility indicators for holdings

• contextual explanations explaining how reinvestment works

The goal was to reduce cognitive load and align the interface with investors’ mental models.

For the website there were quite a few more starting points such as the transaction history, order list or straight under the portfolio. Then all the information would be either be visible o one page or an information page will be shown before that.

Mobile app

Web

For the mobile concept, because this will be a new app feature we had to start from scratch. There were a two starting points that were explored, such as the profile menu or in the wallet. Beyond that we needed a page to explain what dividend reinvestment was and the eligibility criteria, before landing on the actual page to change the settings.

These initial wireframes went through consumer duty testing.

Key findings:

• The 'default' feature in the journey, was not clear

• Users found it hard to switch accounts

• Good consumer understanding of eligibility and fees

• The navigation was still not clear

Final design

Key improvements included:

• clearer dividend status indicators

• simplified controls for enabling reinvestment

• contextual explanations within the UI for feature like 'default preference'

• improved hierarchy of financial information

• Simplier navigation based on user feedback

The design prioritised clarity while maintaining compliance requirements.

Before

After

The final design adopted a hybrid model, allowing users to enable reinvestment globally while maintaining control at the individual holding level. The final solution introduced a more transparent reinvestment experience.

Results & impact

The redesigned experience improved visibility of dividend events and simplified reinvestment actions.

Expected benefits included:

• improved user understanding of dividend processes

• fewer support requests related to dividend payments

• higher engagement with reinvestment features

My learnings

Financial features often involve complex rules that can easily overwhelm users. This project reinforced the importance of clear information architecture and contextual education when designing fintech products.

Future improvements could include deeper portfolio analytics and clearer dividend forecasting.