Empréstimo pessoal: When business rules worked against users
A solution to align the product's timeline with people's actual decision-making pace, within Nubank's personal loan product.
In Nubank's personal loan product, credit conditions were recalculated daily based on credit policy.
At the same time, research showed that people took up to two weeks between their first look at the product and actually taking out a loan.
Conditions changed
Conditions changed before people had made up their minds.
Available amounts dropped
Available amounts could drop — or disappear entirely.
Unexpected mid-flow changes
People were blindsided mid-flow, with no warning that anything had shifted.
This mismatch generated a large volume of complaints and feedback tied directly to the instability of credit conditions.
Approach
Two tracks: prevent frustration before it happened, and handle it better when it did.
The project started with data analysis and customer feedback. From there, we ran collaborative sessions across teams to explore alternatives and prioritize solutions by impact and effort.
Data analysis and customer feedback review
Defining two parallel tracks
Collaborative sessions with product, engineering, customer support, and others
Prioritization by impact and effort
Solution
Track 1 — Transparency about how credit conditions work
- We added in-product communication explaining that conditions could change daily.
- The goal was to set expectations upfront, so people weren't caught off guard when they came back to complete the process.
Track 2 — Hold conditions (offer lock)
- We built a feature that locked the loan offer for a limited period.
- It preserved both the available amount and the interest rate.
- This gave people more time to decide without the risk of losing the offer they'd seen.
Implementation
- One primary action.
- One screen.
- Low technical complexity.
Expected outcome
- Fewer frustrated users before sign-up.
- Better handling of frustration when it did occur.
- More breathing room for decision-making.
Results
The solutions had a direct impact on both user experience and business metrics.
Fewer support tickets
A significant drop in tickets related to zeroed-out loan amounts.
Higher conversion
The loan flow saw a measurable increase in conversion.
Users came back
People began returning to complete the process after using the hold feature, something that hadn't been happening before.
Less friction with support
Recurring frustrations that had been landing on the customer support team decreased noticeably.
Cross-team alignment
Bringing teams together improved support experience and reduced recurring frustrations.
Takeaways
Simple solutions can unlock structural problems.
Transparency reduces frustration, but it doesn't solve the problem on its own.
Giving people time to decide can matter as much as improving the offer.
Simple solutions can unlock structural problems.
Bringing different teams in early makes prioritization and shipping easier.
