“You have to put yourself in the shoes of the customer, you have to spend time with the customer.” – Catherine Richards, Tesco Bank

The banking industry is undergoing a transformation, and at the heart of it is a fundamental shift toward customer-centric design. No longer is it enough to simply offer digital banking solutions—banks must now craft seamless experiences that integrate both digital and human interactions.

In a recent episode of Insights Unlocked, Catherine Richards, Head of Customer Design at Tesco Bank, shared how her team is leading the charge in service design in banking, ensuring that every customer interaction—whether digital or face-to-face—is intuitive, empathetic, and frictionless​.

Breaking down silos: a holistic approach to service design

Many banks are structured around different teams managing different customer touchpoints—mobile apps, call centers, and in-branch services. The result? Customers often feel like they’re being bounced around from department to department. Tesco Bank is tackling this challenge head-on by moving beyond traditional digital design and embracing service design.

“Not all of our touchpoints are digital,” Richards explains. “We involve human contact in a lot of our service offerings for customers. To make sure we are designing the best experiences, we wanted to invest in service design, which looks at the entire end-to-end experience."

Remote video URL

This holistic approach means looking beyond just interfaces and apps to understand how customers engage with the bank at every stage—whether they’re calling for support, resolving a complaint, or navigating financial challenges.

"You have to join that experience up for customers. Otherwise, you're exposing them to your internal silos.”

The power of customer obsession in banking

Every company claims to be customer-centric, but as Richards points out, true customer-centricity requires more than just a mission statement—it demands action. At Tesco Bank, the goal is not just to be customer-centric but customer-obsessed.

“For us, it’s about that really deep understanding of our customers and their needs when it comes to their finances,” Richards shares. “We’re part of Tesco, so we need to understand both their money relationships and their shopping relationships. Where there’s crossover, we can do more to support them."

This mindset shift has led to bold new initiatives, like Customer Wednesdays, a program where employees spend dedicated time engaging directly with customers. Bringing real customer voices into the design process has helped the team create better, more meaningful solutions.

“Until you observe a customer using your product or service, you won’t see the small frustrations they experience,” Richards notes.

Using behavioral design to improve financial well-being

One of the most exciting aspects of service design in banking is the potential to influence customer behavior positively. By leveraging behavioral design, Tesco Bank is helping customers develop healthier financial habits.

“Money stress impacts people’s mental and physical health,” Richards says. “As a financial institution, we have a responsibility to support customers in promoting financial wellness”​.

One example is Tesco Bank’s new savings tool, which allows customers to ring-fence their shopping money weekly, with rounded-up pennies going into a savings pot. Small behavioral nudges like this can make a big difference, particularly for those who believe they can’t save.

“There’s a fine line with nudges—you don’t want too many, but you don’t want too few,” Richards explains. “We’re finding our feet with it, but it’s all about guiding customers in the right direction”​.

"We’re helping customers who think they can’t save believe that they can.”

The role of leadership in driving customer-centric design

For customer-centric design to succeed, leadership must champion the cause. Richards outlines three key responsibilities for leaders in this space:

1. Set a clear vision – “Every company says they’re customer-centric, but it’s difficult in practice. Leadership needs to set a clear ambition.”
2. Create the right environment – “If you don’t have the right environment, even the best designers won’t stay in your organization.”
3. Positively disrupt – “Sometimes you have to shake up the status quo to create better experiences”​.

At Tesco Bank, one of the biggest disruptions was integrating customer research into leadership conversations. By investing in ethnographic research—spending time with customers in their homes and shopping with them—the team could bring real stories back into the business.

“You don’t remember the theory behind customer-centricity,” Richards says. “But you remember the story of a mother who had to choose between buying a winter coat for her daughter or paying for the week’s groceries”​.

The future of banking: a blend of digital and human experiences

The pandemic accelerated digital banking adoption, but it also highlighted the importance of human connection in financial services. Tesco Bank is balancing both.

“We’re transitioning to a digital-first bank, but customers still want to call us when they have complex needs,” Richards explains. “The key is ensuring that experience is seamless”​.

For example, rather than forcing customers to choose between an app or a call center, Tesco Bank designs experiences that integrate both. If a customer starts a process in the app but needs help, they can easily transition to speaking with a support agent who already has the context.

Designing for the customer, not just the business

Catherine Richards and her team at Tesco Bank are proving that great banking experiences don’t just happen—they are designed with deep customer insight, continuous iteration, and a relentless focus on removing friction.

“We don’t want to ship the org chart,” Richards says. “We want to create seamless experiences for our customers, no matter how they choose to engage with us”​.

"We want to be customer-obsessed, not just customer-centric.”

By embracing customer-centric design and leading with empathy, banks can not only improve customer experiences but also drive loyalty and trust in an industry where those qualities are more valuable than ever.

Episode links: 

• Customer-centric product development: build better products fast: This guide discusses how customer-centricity drives business results by solving real customer problems, leading to higher adoption rates and increased loyalty.
• Financial services resources: A collection of resources for banking and financial services experiences, including use cases, guides, best practices, expert advice, test templates, podcasts, and webinars.
• Why your organization needs a customer-centric approach: This blog post emphasizes the importance of a customer-centric approach for organizational growth and success, offering tips and best practices for building such a strategy.
• Use case guidebook for financial services & banks: This guide shares common use cases and stories of how financial services customers have leveraged the UserTesting platform to gather fast and relevant insights.
• 50 questions to ask financial services customers: A blog post providing a list of questions to help financial services organizations better understand their customers' needs and preferences.