Turning Thomas Cook’s forex app from FX Now into TC Pay, so buying currency, loading a travel card or sending money abroad takes a few taps instead of a branch visit.
Proto-personas built from store reviews, support themes and stakeholder interviews. Each one shaped a part of the app.
“My parents send money for fees and rent. I need it to land on time, every time.”
“I just want the best rate and the forex at my door before we fly.”
“If my card gets stuck abroad, I can’t wait for a call centre.”
FX Now asked for the same paperwork as a branch, one long form at a time. Rates could change mid-checkout, payments sometimes went through with no confirmation, and customers ended up back at the counter to sort it out. Card tasks like changing limits or resetting a PIN were buried or missing. Store reviews sat at around two stars.
What reviewers kept saying
Orders went missing after payment
Login and OTP loops
No control over my own card
Buy, Sell, Send, Remit, Reload and Encash, all one tap away from a single bottom bar.
Lock the rate, see every rupee of GST and TCS, then pay. No surprises at checkout.
Limits, PIN, blocking and device registration, all self-serve instead of a call or a branch visit.
We grouped every task by the job the customer came to do, not by Thomas Cook’s internal product names. The five bottom-bar tabs map to those jobs; account and support live in the menu.
Bottom bar: Buy Forex · Send Money · Cards · Sell Forex · Remit Fees
Login loops were a top complaint. We kept OTP and added Google and Apple sign-in, then moved repeat visits to an M-PIN or biometrics, so most sessions skip OTP entirely.
The Buy flow opens with live rates and a simple choice: card, cash or a combo. Customers can lock today’s rate by paying just 2% upfront.
The quotation summary splits cash and card, adds GST and TCS line by line, and shows how long the rate stays valid, with a best-price guarantee on top.
Balances for every currency sit on one screen. Contactless, ATM, POS and online limits can be switched and capped in seconds.
Cards are tied to a registered device. If a phone changes, the app explains what happened and gets the card registered again in one step.
I also designed the web admin that Thomas Cook’s team uses to run the app day to day: card banners, transaction banners, discount codes, FAQs, login pop-ups and historical quotes, each scheduled by OS and app version.
Store reviews, support tickets and the old FX Now flows.
User flows and an information architecture built around six money jobs.
A shared kit of fields, rate cards, chips and sheets for every flow.
Final screens for iOS and Android, plus the web admin module.
Rebrand from FX Now to TC Pay and Play Store assets.
The same services, a better experience. After the TC Pay launch the store rating climbed from about two stars to 4.8, on the strength of UX changes alone.
Tracked release by release, alongside how often reviews mentioned failed payments or login trouble.
Drop-off between quote, traveller details and payment in the Buy Forex funnel.
Limit changes, PIN resets and blocks done in the app instead of through support.
Share of sessions that reached Home without an OTP retry, after M-PIN and biometrics.
100K+ downloads on Google Play