Fold — Freelancer Finance Dashboard

Fold is a fintech startup building financial tooling for independent professionals — designers, developers, consultants, and translators — across Spain and Portugal. Their core product was an invoicing and expense tracking app that had grown organically from a simple invoice generator into something significantly more complex.

By the time I joined the project, Fold had 4,200 active users and a churn rate that was climbing. Exit surveys pointed to a consistent theme: "It's too complicated for what I need."

The Problem

The dashboard had evolved without a coherent design strategy. Features had been added in response to user requests without considering how they integrated with each other. The result was an interface that showed every piece of financial data simultaneously — with no hierarchy, no prioritisation, and no clear entry point.

• The main dashboard had 14 visible data modules — users couldn't identify what to look at first
• The invoice flow required 9 steps and 3 separate screens for a basic invoice — vs. competitors at 4–5
• Expense categorisation was mandatory and rigid — freelancers with irregular income found the categories didn't match their work
• The most-used action (creating a new invoice) was buried under two navigation layers
• No mobile optimisation — 34% of users accessed the product via phone

My Role

End-to-end product design: UX audit, user research, information architecture redesign, UI design, and prototype testing via Maze. I also collaborated with the engineering team on feasibility for the proposed IA changes.

I conducted a 3-week research phase combining a UX audit, user interviews, and usage data analysis.

UX Audit

I mapped every screen in the product, identified the primary user flows for the 5 most common tasks, and logged every point where users had to make a decision without sufficient context. The audit surfaced 34 distinct friction points across the core flows.

User Interviews (8 participants)

I interviewed 8 active users across different professional categories. The clearest finding: most users came to Fold for one thing — creating invoices and knowing if they'd been paid. Everything else — tax estimation, expense reports, profit/loss charts — was secondary at best, irrelevant at worst for most users.

Clarity through hierarchy, not removal

1. Three-layer Information Architecture

I reorganised the dashboard into three clear layers: Today (pending invoices, overdue payments, action required), This Month (income received, expenses logged, tax estimate), and Overview (year-to-date summary, client breakdown). Users could scan in 10 seconds — or drill down into each layer when needed.

2. Persistent Quick-Create Button

A floating action button accessible from every screen — "New Invoice" — always visible, always one tap away. The most common user action went from 3 taps to 1.

3. Simplified Invoice Flow: 9 → 4 Steps

I redesigned the invoice creation flow with smart defaults: the last-used client pre-filled, standard VAT rate pre-applied, and a "duplicate last invoice" shortcut for recurring work. Optional fields (payment terms, notes, attachments) were collapsed by default — accessible but not mandatory.

4. Flexible Expense Categories

I replaced the rigid category taxonomy with a system that allowed users to name their own categories in addition to choosing from a simplified default list. For tax purposes, the system mapped user-defined categories to the appropriate tax categories in the background — visible on demand, not forced upfront.

5. Responsive Mobile Design

I designed a dedicated mobile layout prioritising the three most-used actions: view outstanding invoices, create new invoice, and log an expense. The desktop dashboard adapted progressively — no separate mobile app required.

• Advanced users: A segment of power users relied on the full data visibility of the original dashboard. I designed a toggle to switch between the simplified default view and the full data view — preserving existing functionality without forcing it on everyone.
• Tax compliance: Spanish tax requirements meant certain data capture was mandatory. I worked with the tax advisor to understand which fields were legally required vs. which were precautionary — reducing mandatory fields by approximately 40%.
• Technical debt: The existing codebase made some of the IA changes complex to implement. We agreed on a phased rollout — shipping the dashboard restructure and invoice flow first, with the expense module following in a second release.

• Invoice creation time dropped from an average of 4.2 minutes to 1.8 minutes in prototype testing.
• In usability testing with 6 participants, task completion rate for the core flows improved from 58% to 94%.
• The simplified default dashboard tested significantly better with new users — the "overwhelmed on first use" response disappeared entirely in the testing cohort.
• The mobile layout addressed the previously unserved 34% of users who had been using an interface not designed for their screen size.