05 · Payment Experience

Designing a Better Payment Experience

Improving payment confidence through clearer interaction feedback, streamlined device setup, and cohesive motion—helping guests complete transactions successfully on the first attempt.

Toast Flex payment hardware in a full-service restaurant

Role: Product Designer
Timeline: 2024–2026
Platforms: Android POS, Payment Hardware
Scope: Payment, Interaction Design, Motion
Status: Concept tested

Challenge

Hardware constraints and competing on-screen cues led guests toward the most prominent interaction—even when the payment action happened somewhere else.

Approach

I explored clearer visual hierarchy and motion cues that directed attention toward the card reader at the moment of payment.

Result

The tested animation improved first-attempt payment success by 53% in the initial concept study.

Additional customer testing—especially in kiosk setups—is still needed to understand the real-world impact across device contexts.

Challenge

Design within—and beyond—the constraints

Hardware constraints led to incorrect interactions because users, overloaded with information, were inclined to react to the most prominent element: paying directly on the screen.

The design opportunity was to make the intended physical action unmistakable without adding more competing information.

Payment hardware observed in restaurant service environments — Payment hardware in operational contexts

First-attempt payment success rates across four earlier prompt concepts — First-attempt success rates for the previous design directions

Research & validation

Triangulate behavior across three forms of testing

Each method answered a different question—from identifying interaction breakdowns quickly to understanding how the concept performed with customers and where visual attention landed.

Internal testing

Quickly identify interaction breakdowns and compare early prompt directions before broader testing.

Customer testing

Observe how customers responded to the payment experience with working hardware in context.

Online survey + heat map

Compare visual prompt concepts and understand which areas attracted attention across a broader remote study.

+53%First-attempt payment success rate

Solution

Use motion to direct attention at the moment that matters

Clear visual animation improved payment success, minimized confusion, and helped keep the service line moving.

Motion concept for the guest payment prompt

What still needs validation

Test the experience across real device contexts

For key TDA use cases, additional customer testing data is needed—especially from kiosk setups—to accurately assess the real-world impact of the change.

Validation on working payment hardware

Future consideration

Adapt the motion system to different screen orientations

If time and resources allow, the next step is to define how the animation should adapt across landscape and portrait screen orientations.

Payment prompt direction shown across landscape and portrait screen orientations — Landscape and portrait payment prompt studies

Next project

Exploring AI Beyond the Screen

Exploring how voice, vision, and ambient intelligence can make restaurant hardware context-aware and proactive.