General Overview & Inspiration

Penny Pinch is a financial web platform designed for college students to budget with ease. As a group of college students ourselves, it was important for us to focus on something that could lessen the burden of balancing personal finances, keeping up with schoolwork, and handling the pressure of work all at once. As students, we know how important it is to have technologies that are designed to make people's lives easier.

First, we considered the facts.

• According to EBCSO Information Serivces, More than 40% of college students are not equipped with financial literacy knowledge.
• According to InChard Debt Solutions, Only 38% of college-educated people in the U.S. practice a budgeting habit

Then, we considered the feelings.

The truth of the matter is that sometimes...

• Budgeting is hard although useful.
• Budgeting is difficult and boring.
• Budgeting is overly-complicated and frustrating.
  

Now, the real question is, how did we tackle this idea? By making our design and development as simple, functional, and readable as possible. Our UI is clean and straightforward, while our development adds a detailed breakdown of the user's finances.

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Main Features

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Design Sketches

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Development VS. Design Reflection

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In conclusion, Penny Pinch was a fun design that didn’t take too much time away from the main focus. At times when I wanted to make it more in-depth, I realized that it defeated the purpose of the platform—keeping it as simple as possible. However, that doesn’t mean it’s perfect.

Places where the design could have been improved:

• Ensuring that the transaction area is clear. I’ve noticed that there is no text indicating the transaction history, which would have been more helpful for the user.
• Introduce placeholders in the input fields to clarify their intended use.
  

Future developmental implementation:

• Artificial Intelligence Chatbot: A guide when no one is easily accessible or available.
• Customizable Categorization: Allowing users to input transactions that may fall outside of the main categories.
• Cleaner Design to Development Implementation: Streamlining the design and development process for a more intuitive user experience.

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Development VS. Design

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Desktop Prototype

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Live Development

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