Increasing trust with transparent payouts

Our team received near-constant feedback that hosts were confused about when their revenue would land in their bank account, causing unnecessary frustration.

Since event hosts tend to choose a platform that offers the most intuitive and cohesive solution, ensuring a smooth payout experience was vital to Plots’ continued growth.

I tackled the issue by designing a new section of the app called “Payouts” that afforded hosts control of their finances without compromising simplicity and visual appeal.

diagnosing the problem

Plots uses Stripe to manage financial logistics. Upon investigating the Stripe accounts of the hosts who messaged us, we noticed that all of their payouts were paused because of easy to fix problems like uploading an ID.

Our app minimized interactions with Stripe by hiding Stripe after users link an account. However, this set-it-and-forget-it approach was backfiring because it only accounted for the happy path.

By not accounting for Stripe-related issues, our app left users without a clue why payouts had abruptly stopped.

design approach

To prevent payout pauses, users needed to be proactively alerted of any Stripe issues, but users also needed to see payout at a glance. The solution was simple: take everything users can see on their Stripe page and put it in Plots app. Since hosts do almost all their event management through our app, financial details should be situated there as well.

The real challenge was designing a interface that balanced user needs with range of other caveats and variables. Verified hosts and unverified hosts received payouts on different schedules, and there were four possible states of a user’s Stripe: connected, not connected, issue, or paused.

Technical constraints also arose and required close collaboration with engineers. Together, we defined three custom APIs to call information from Stripe that made the design feasible.

Designing a dynamic UI

The result was a new page in the Plots app that enhances payout visibility. It was designed for hosts managing multiple events and displays payout information for all events combined.

Our custom APIs made the integration of data from Stripe feel natural. They also powered alerts that call out specific issues with Stripe and prompt hosts to resolve those issues.

A payout schedule keeps hosts in the loop, allowing them to plan accordingly. A display of the payout method shows where money is going and includes an option to change it if needed.

Other features I designed

ticket purchase flow

revamped onboarding

enhanced host dashboard

Important hosting functions were situated in unintuitive places that required extensive navigation.

The redesigned hosting dashboard places those functions on the same page where events are created and managed.

Key Takeaways

Focus on what matters

Plots’ short runway, coupled with the high bar for consumer products, created a narrow path for success. These constraints taught me to determine when to produce rough wireframes versus polished UI designs, and that avoiding getting lost in details is key to working effectively in fast-paced environments.

Move fast and make things

In early-stage startups, everything is an experiment. Without product analytics set up, I relied on confidence to make design decisions and got comfortable shooting from the hip. I learned that when a team is getting a product off the ground, done is better than perfect.

Be specific

I worked with remote developers, which presented communication challenges. This experience taught me a valuable lesson: to ensure your designs are accurately reflected in the build, leave nothing open to the developer's interpretation.

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