Square: Risk Management
Desktop + Mobile App
ROLE
Product Designer
OVERVIEW
Running a business can be scary. There are many things business owners have to think about, from people to products to customers; it's easy to forget about all the risks involved in the process.
Square has been providing businesses with their point of sale solution since 2009. They have built an entire business toolkit of hardware and software products that allow business owners to accept and track transactions. To help protect buisness owners and themselves from credit risk, Square has recently emphasized design in its risk tools. We worked with the internal risk design team to design these tools that help sellers protect themselves.
CONTRACTS
When a seller's business is dependent on large, infrequent payments (e.g. contractors, artists, etc.), a chargeback can make a pretty big dent in their business. Square's Contracts product started as a set of google docs that account managers could recommend to their sellers to download, edit, and then attach to individual sales. After being released in 2020, there was a significant uptick in disputes won when the seller had a contract associated with them. This resulted in tons of feature requests to make the product more flexible.
RESERVES
Reserves help sellers avoid a negative balance from unexpected chargebacks. By keeping a portion of sales safe in a reserves balance, sellers can ensure that they will always have enough money to cover any sudden expenses.
After talking with sellers with a reserve, Square found that the current dashboard is hard to find and doesn't show the data sellers need to stay on top of their expenses. We used this information to inform our design decisions and created a communication-oriented experience that explains all nuances of a seller's reserve.
TIERED RESERVES
Tiered Reserves expand upon Reserves by allowing sellers to take payments up to a threshold before a Reserve is applied. Tiered Reserves are a series of tiers related to a seller's processing that determines a hold rate. It's a complex process involving many different numbers and time schedules. In order to ensure that the information was easily understood, we focused on making the information glaceable and surfacing the most relevant processing information. This allows business owners to quickly see what would happen to their finances if they were to make a sale at that moment. To fill in the bigger picture, we added supporting data to give the seller a more clear and transparent view into their reserve.
PRIORITIZING CLARITY
Throughout the project, we were able to add clarity for sellers wanting to protect themselves from the risks involved for small businesses. We utilized hierarchy and emphasized making information glanceable to allow sellers to get in and out, finding the data they need quickly. It was important to us to make sure sellers understood all aspects of the risk tool they were using, so we worked with the content team to craft emails and informational cards that the seller could reference at any point.
Working with the Square Risk team to design risk products has been a rewarding experience. We were able to help unblock their risk teams while advocating for sellers in a complex problem area. We are excited to see what Square accomplishes as they continue on their mission to help sellers fight credit risk.