U.S Business banking xpress

How might we provide electronic signature capabilities for U.S Business Banking clients during the account opening process?

Sr. Product Designer | 2023

Achievements

Our Why

Challenges

UX Treatment

Achievements

The U.S. Business Banking team introduced Electronic Signature (E-Sign), enabling business clients to easily sign documents when opening a business deposit or lending account.

  • Eliminated the need for clients to re-visit a branch for document signatures, giving them the ability to sign documents from wherever they are.
  • E-Sign transactions sit at a 79% success rate when utilized by business bankers.
  • Optimized the business banker workflow by reducing the amount of manual effort when handling physical documents.
OUR WHY

In line with BMO's Ambition 2025 initiative to become a digital-first bank, we developed E-Sign, a feature designed to streamline workflows and compete with the evolving digital banking landscape.

Why will a client love E-Sign?

E-Sign ensures client convenience by eliminating the need for branch visits or rushed banker interactions, making document signatures accessible from anywhere in the world and removing potential friction associated with physical signatures.

What issues did Business Bankers face with physical signatures?

Chasing down customers

Not every signer is available in-person, which can delay or halt the account opening process.

Manual uploading & printing

Bankers can potentially upload & print 20 documents per client, which can be time consuming.

Too many physical docs

In an effort to be environmentally conscious, electronic signature would reduce the amount of paper.

Challenges

When you have a new feature that doesn't fit within the existing application flow, your first instinct is to tear it down. But that wasn't an option, and we had to battle the constraints.

This wasn't about delivering a perfect solution. We had to deliver a true MVP that was feasible and usable, from both a technical and user perspective.

UX Treatment

I facilitated conversations that focused on deep understanding, which helped us identify key objectives and challenges at both an application and user-experience level.

Understand the Problems

I lead a series of 4 workshops, entirely virtual, with 12+ business partners. We examined the 3 existing application journeys, identifying the challenges and opportunities.

Define the problems

By creating How Might We Statements, it allowed us to see which features would provide the most value & impact for both business bankers and their clients.

Design proposal

I was able to ideate and propose the ideal experiences that would support E-Sign capabilities within it's respective application journey.

Outcomes

We delivered a solution that resolved some of the problems we identified during our collaborative sessions. We continue to revisit E-Sign, in hopes to achieve an ideal state for both our U.S Business Bankers and clients.

Bankers can view E-Sign status from both a document package and individual signer level.

This design aims to give the banker a clear look at the signature status of these documents. By having this information, the client can know who has and hasn't signed their documents.

Deposit accounts are held in a "Pending" status until the documents have been signed.

Deposit accounts that are opened before signatures are collected was a huge problem for the business. We saw a large amount of accounts opened without the necessary signatures.

Entity-level documents are located in one place within the application journey

Originally, entity-level documents were scattered across the application. Now, the entity-level docs can be found in one central location and the signers can be selected for a particular document.

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