Sales cancellation:
from a complex operation to a self-service experience
Results
More than 83,000 cancellation requests.
70% of the main issues identified through support ticket analysis were resolved.
12% reduction in the volume of contacts with the customer service center.
89% of requests were completed digitally, compared with 11% through other channels (phone, email, support, etc.).
Client
Rede (Itaú Empresas)
Industry
Payment services
Service
Product design
Period
2021-2024
Confidentiality Notice (NDA): The screens presented in this case study were recreated exclusively for portfolio purposes.
They do not contain confidential information, real customer data, or proprietary commercial content.
Any names, documents, account numbers, and other information are fictional and used for illustrative purposes only.
The layout was based on Desyre, a Design System discontinued in 2024, and does not represent the current Sales Cancellation flow or Voxel iDS, Itaú Empresas' current Design System.
Objective
Enable digital sales cancellation, reducing dependence on the customer service center and making operations more efficient, particularly for merchants with high transaction volumes.
Context
In March 2021, Rede held a 21.3% share of the Brazilian merchant acquiring market and was the second-largest player in the sector.
The challenge was to transform a complex operation, dependent on a legacy technology ecosystem, into a simple, accessible, and autonomous experience.
The main guiding principles were:
Self-service: reduce dependence on the customer service center.
Efficiency: facilitate high-volume operations.
Clarity: make rules and actions easier to understand.
Accessibility: consider different usage needs from the MVP stage.
Incremental evolution: deliver value without disregarding existing technical constraints.
Previous experience, < 2019, Legacy portal
It occurs when a merchant requests the cancellation of a sale, for example, following a product return, an exchange for an item with a different value, or the cancellation of a service within the statutory seven-day period.
What Is a sales cancellation?
My role and responsibilities
Product Designer on the squad
I collaborated with the Product Owner, business stakeholders, Tech Lead, development, and QA teams.
Discovery: research into usability challenges and usability testing.
Mapping: analysis of the user journey, business rules, and other dependencies.
Accessibility: experience validation through testing with assistive technologies.
Evolution: identification of opportunities beyond the MVP.
Discovery
To understand where the journey was breaking down, we combined three sources of evidence:
Operational data: analysis of support tickets and Likert-scale assessments to identify recurring issues.
Merchant interviews: conversations with users to investigate their difficulties with the portal.
Benchmarking: analysis of competitors' cancellation flows to identify improvement opportunities.
Materials developed during stakeholder co-creation sessions.
Since the existing architecture could not be replaced immediately, the strategy was to simplify the experience within technical constraints without compromising operational rules.
The MVP scope was defined with the Business team and stakeholders, supported by an Effort versus Value matrix. Prioritization considered four criteria:
Value: impact on merchants and operations.
Effort: implementation complexity.
Technology: legacy system dependencies and limitations.
Business: operational rules and stakeholder priorities.
Key design decisions
Prioritize autonomy: enable cancellation without relying on the customer service center.
Support operations at scale: accommodate bulk cancellations for merchants with high transaction volumes.
Simplify complexity: make actions easier to understand without compromising business requirements.
Evolve safely: respect legacy system limitations and prioritize value-driven releases.
Validation and accessibility
I led usability testing to identify comprehension, navigation, and interaction issues before production, using the findings to guide iterations.
In collaboration with QA, I also validated accessibility requirements, including the use of assistive technologies and VoiceOver.
From web to mobile experience
The solution was adapted for mobile devices, taking interaction patterns and usage context into account. Rather than simply reproducing desktop screens, we reorganized information and actions to preserve clarity and user autonomy throughout the journey.
Results and Recognition
In 2022, the project received two internal awards: Project with the Highest Accessibility and MVP with the Best Results, in the Design/Product area.
Operational results:
83,000+
cancellation requests
70%
of the main issues identified through support ticket analysis were resolved
89%
reduction in the volume of contacts with the customer service center
12%
of requests were completed digitally, compared with 11% through other channels (phone, email, support, etc.)
*These indicators reflect progress in the self-service journey and reduced dependence on customer service channels.
Project with the Highest Accessibility, Design/Product.
Top 3 MVPs with the Best Results, Design/Product.
Key Learnings
Understanding the relationship between processes, business rules, technology, and user behavior is essential to identifying the root causes of friction and proposing viable solutions.
Even with legacy systems, the experience can be improved by identifying which constraints must be respected and where design can simplify interactions.
Combining support tickets, feedback, interviews, benchmarking, and technical constraints helped direct MVP prioritization toward opportunities relevant to users and the business.
In a self-service journey, accessibility is a fundamental part of enabling users to complete tasks independently.