The checkout crisis that taught us everything about customer trust

A 3-point drop in conversion. Rising complaints. A payment page users didn’t trust. Here's how we turned things around—and what you can learn from it.

The Quiet Decline That Nearly Broke Our Checkout

At first, it looked like a minor blip.

As CX/UX Product Manager at a fashion e-commerce group, I noticed a 0.8-point drop in our conversion rate at the final step of the checkout. It wasn’t dramatic—but it was persistent.

In e-commerce, a slow bleed is worse than a sudden break. That dip translated into tens of thousands in lost revenue each month—and, more importantly, signaled a growing customer experience issue in our most sensitive touchpoint: payment.

We needed to act fast.

The Cross-Functional Task Force That Saved the Funnel

We formed a "Payment SWAT team"—a collaboration between Product, Tech, and our PSP—to hunt down the source of the friction.

We ran two parallel investigations:

Behavioral analytics deep-dive (user journey recordings, support feedback, analytics)
Technical diagnosis (PSP logs, server error tracking, legacy data review)

The results exceeded our fears.

From friction to familiarity: Localized currencies, languages, and UX cues built trust — and conversions.

What the Data Told Us (And What Our Customers Were Silently Screaming)

Customers spent 25% more time on the payment page than normal
Many users were looping back to payment after validation
Session recordings showed growing post-failure confusion
Support was flooded with messages like: “I thought my card was hacked.”, “I gave up after the third try.”

This wasn’t buyer hesitation—it was a trust crisis triggered by technical glitches and unclear guidance.

The Technical Reality Behind the Mess

Our payment process was breaking down quietly behind the scenes :

3D Secure failures due to a PSP/server sync issue
Intermittent 500 errors hard to reproduce
Outdated customer data being sent to banks (like unused landlines)
A poorly-timed Ingenico upgrade that throttled 3DS performance

Customers were hitting an invisible wall—then getting no help climbing over it.

Our Playbook: Fixing the Flow, Fast

We launched a two-tiered plan: triage now, rebuild smarter.

✅ Quick Wins (First 2 Weeks)

Cleaned up invalid data fields in our payment form
Enabled auto-fill and ID tokens to reduce 3DS steps for return users
Rewrote system errors into human-readable messages like:
“This card was declined. Please try another or contact your bank.”

🧱 Long-Term Foundation

Planned a progressive migration to Adyen, starting with 5% of new users
Built a flexible iframe-based checkout to decouple from legacy dependencies
Benchmarked UX flows from high-end competitors to redesign our form

The resign of our in frame Payment form

What Changed—And Why It Mattered

Within weeks, we saw measurable improvements:

This wasn’t just a revenue win. It was a trust win

Your payment experience is your brand's final handshake—make sure it feels confident, not clumsy

What We Learned (So You Don’t Have To)

Test PSP Migrations Gradually
What works in staging never works exactly the same in prod. Start small. Monitor. Expand carefully.
Enrich Data to Reduce Friction
Returning users shouldn’t have to jump through the same hoops. Smarter data = higher conversion.
Bad Error Messages Destroy Trust
Generic messages confuse. Helpful ones retain customers even when things fail.
Payments Deserve Ongoing Attention
We now run monthly Payment Health Reviews tracking 3DS performance, refusal rates, and form UX metrics.

Date:

30 May 2025

Category:

Place Des Tendances