Best Digital Financial Inclusion Initiative 2024
Role: UI Designer | Stakeholders: The Digital Banker / Global Retail Banking Innovation Awards 2024, DAC (Digital Accessibility Centre)
Principles: WGAG2.1AA| Tools: Signly, Readable
Read About it at Santander
Overview
As UI Designer, I was responsible for driving the accessibility vision of Santander's mobile banking app, helping secure the Best Digital Financial Inclusion Initiative 2024 award:​
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Accessibility-First Design: I ensured the app went beyond WCAG 2.1 AA standards, focusing on colour contrast, font scaling, and intuitive interactions to deliver the best mobile banking experience.
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User-Centered Design: I collaborated with real users from an accessibility panel, refining the interface based on their feedback to ensure practical usability.
Collaborative Effort: I worked closely with developers to integrate features that benefited 2.8 million users with accessibility settings enabled.
Intuitive UI Design: I focused on creating a clean, consistent UI, with clear visual hierarchy, legible typography, and easily identifiable interactive elements to enhance accessibility for all users.
Santander’s Comments
Did you know that 1 in 5 people have a form of impairment or disability? That's a lot of people. So we created a new mobile banking app that's digitally accessible, so accessible that we won Best Digital Financial Inclusion Initiative 2024. We won this award by ensuring accessibility was (and still is) at the heart of our app's creation.
We worked with a real-life accessibility panel for testing, made sure everything is written and displayed clearly, tested it works well with screen readers, and more. Creating experiences that are accessible for all is at the heart of everything we do here at Santander, and we continue to make positive changes for customers and colleagues.
The Digital Banker’s Comments
Santander strives to be an inclusive and accessible bank, present for significant moments for both individual and business customers. Importantly, the Bank has undertaken a collaborative design with people with disabilities to develop the mobile app's upcoming versions, ensuring accessibility for all 6 million users