Customer
Make it immediately clear whether SubMe is available and what the customer can currently access.
Case study
thinkmoney SubMe.
Design a simple short-term credit experience that helps eligible customers understand what they can borrow, what they need to do and what happens next.
Role
Head of Design
Focus
Proposition, eligibility and UX
Product
thinkmoney SubMe
Contribution
Product thinking, journey design, customer states and interface direction
Overview
Making small amounts of credit easier to understand and manage.
SubMe gives eligible thinkmoney customers access to small amounts of short-term credit directly through their existing banking experience.
The product needed to make borrowing straightforward while still clearly communicating eligibility, available limits and what customers could expect before deciding to continue.
I led the design direction across the proposition, customer journey and interface, working with product, engineering and commercial teams to translate the underlying credit rules into a simpler customer experience.
The challenge
Credit needed to feel simple without making borrowing feel casual.
Customers needed to understand quickly whether SubMe was available to them, how much they could access and what they needed to do next.
The challenge was to remove unnecessary friction while keeping the information required to make an informed borrowing decision clear and visible.
Product
Turn eligibility rules and changing limits into one coherent, repeatable customer journey.
Business
Create a controlled credit proposition that can evolve without continually redesigning the customer experience.
Eligibility
The product needed to explain a decision customers could not see.
Eligibility was informed by account behaviour, including at least £500 coming into the account and at least two Direct Debits or Standing Orders.
Customers did not need to understand every rule behind that decision. They needed a clear answer about their current status and what, if anything, they could do next.
The interface focused on customer-facing states rather than exposing the complexity of the underlying decision model.
Design principles
Four principles kept the experience focused.
Be clear about availability
Customers should quickly understand whether SubMe is available and the amount they can currently access.
Explain before action
Important borrowing and repayment information should appear before the customer commits.
Hide system complexity
Credit rules should shape the experience without requiring customers to interpret those rules themselves.
Design for progression
The interface needed to support changing available limits without creating a new journey each time.
Journey design
Designed around the questions customers needed answered.
Available?
Understand whether SubMe can currently be accessed.
How much?
See the amount currently available to borrow.
What does it mean?
Understand the important borrowing and repayment information.
What next?
Continue, manage the product or understand the current state.
Limit progression
The product needed to work as available credit changed.
SubMe uses stepped limits beginning at £25 and progressing up to £300.
Rather than designing a different experience around every amount, I treated the limit as a changing product state within one consistent journey.
This keeps the experience familiar as the amount available to a customer changes over time.
Exploration
The work was less about adding screens and more about removing uncertainty.
Early exploration focused on how much information customers needed at each point and how eligibility, available limits and borrowing information should be introduced.
The strongest directions made the customer's current position obvious first, then revealed supporting detail close to the point where it became relevant.
Customer states
Not every customer arrives with the same needs.
Eligible
Customers who meet the criteria need a direct route into understanding their available amount and next action.
Not currently eligible
Customers need a clear answer without being led through a journey they cannot complete.
Active
Customers already using SubMe need their current position prioritised over acquisition messaging.
Changing limit
When the amount available changes, the experience communicates that without making the product feel unfamiliar.
Key design decisions
Simplicity came from deciding what customers needed to know first.
Lead with the current amount
The credit currently available became one of the clearest pieces of information in the experience.
Explain before commitment
Important borrowing information remained close to the decision rather than being hidden behind the final action.
Design around states
The interface responds to eligibility and account position rather than forcing every customer through the same flow.
Keep progression familiar
Changing limits reuse the same core patterns so customers do not have to relearn the product as it evolves.
Trade-offs
Removing friction could not mean removing necessary information.
Simplicity over explanation
Customers did not need the internal eligibility model, only a clear explanation of their current position.
Consistency over bespoke flows
Reusing core patterns across different limits makes the product easier to recognise and maintain.
Clarity over persuasion
The product prioritises a customer's current position and explains borrowing clearly before introducing another possible action.
Interface hierarchy
Make the customer's position clear before asking them to act.
The interface prioritises the information customers need to understand first: whether SubMe is available, the amount they can access and their next action.
Supporting borrowing information remains visible and accessible around that decision without competing with the primary message.
Final experience
SubMe as a recognisable part of the banking experience.
Outcome
A clearer framework for offering small amounts of credit.
Clear
Translates eligibility, available limits and customer states into a clearer, more understandable experience.
Progressive
Supports stepped limits from £25 through to £300 within one consistent product structure.
Integrated
Positions the credit experience within the wider thinkmoney account rather than as a disconnected standalone journey.
Product value
The work created a reusable experience around a changing credit offer.
One core journey
Different available credit limits can be supported without creating separate product experiences.
Clearer eligibility
Complex internal rules are translated into clearer customer states and understandable next steps.
Familiar interaction
Existing banking patterns connect SubMe to the wider account experience rather than making it feel bolted on.
Designed to evolve
The structure accommodates changing limits and customer states without requiring the journey to be rebuilt.
Reflection
The hard part was not the borrowing flow. It was making the rules feel simple.
SubMe reinforced the importance of separating product complexity from customer complexity. Eligibility rules, customer states and changing limits can all exist behind the experience without requiring customers to understand every mechanism.
The design work concentrated on translating those rules into clear answers: whether the product is available, what the customer can access and what they need to understand before continuing.
It was another example of product design being as much about structuring information and decisions as designing individual screens.