People don’t like maths

Information designers are often asked to design financial documents. Unless you’re designing for experts, be aware that many people struggle with figures – they (OK… we, because I’m one of them) can’t look at a table of numbers and see the trend. We seek relevance in numbers – what’s the total, what’s it mean for me, can I afford it, am I being ripped off?¹

Some tips from my own experience:

• Give a headline number – on a bill this is probably the amount I owe. On a bank statement it’s how much money I have. On an insurance renewal, it’s the price.
• Drill down to more detail for people who need it. How did you arrive at the total? What’s included in the price?
• Explain calculations, but not prominently. By this I mean they shouldn’t dominate the page and make it look complicated, but they should be available somewhere.
• Link to teaching helps. For very complicated financial documents, such as pensions information, consider adding tutorial notes, or linking to videos that explain them.
• Be consistent with other communications the reader might have seen. For example, if the sales blurb says I’ll pay £25 a month for my broadband, I want the figure of £25 to be prominent on my bill somewhere.  

It’s always helpful to test financial documents – there’s so much room for misunderstandings that you may not predict.

And as you design them you become familiar with the content, and easily forget what’s it like not to know what you now know.

1. Australian designer Alex Tyers gave a great talk on financial information design for the IIID. You can view it on YouTube. The title of this page is a quote from him.