ROLE
Lead designer
TEAM
Design manager, lead designer, QA, iOS + Android developers
TIMELINE
3 months including development
SUMMARY
The iCount POS tablet app is available to users with the Advanced Inventory module, syncing with their inventory for seamless sales without manual invoicing.
The app had been overlooked for too long, and user feedback highlighted critical areas for improvement. I led the redesign of the storefront to address these issues, creating a streamlined experience that lets users focus on what matters most: managing their small business.
Through this redesign, I cut the time to add one item to the cart from 2-3 clicks in 5-7 seconds to 1 click in 1 second and significantly improved storefront organisation for users.
iCOUNT POS
The POS storefront experience: redesigning with the user in mind
So what's the problem?
TL;DR
The iCount POS app needed a UX overhaul. Users struggled with a cluttered storefront and slow item addition, making transactions inefficient. My redesign focused on improving storefront organisation and reducing friction in the sales process.
Existing flow
❌ No way to organise the storefront, only endless scrolling
❌ The item spotlight takes up to 4 seconds to load - averaging 5-6 seconds to add an item to cart
❌ The keyboard is active automatically - the user instinctively lowers it before clicking on “Add to cart”
❌ The item spotlight is messy and disorganised - a lot of confusion where to look
❌ Item names truncate after 17 characters, making longer names unreadable.
What our users were saying
The most common complaints and requests were that users did not use product images, that there was not enough space in the item cards for the item names, and there were constant request for inventory categories
What were our first steps?
My manager and I reviewed user feedback and common queries in Intercom, also consulting our tech support team to pinpoint the most frequent complaints about the POS app. Furthermore, we interviewed several of our POS users in order to get a clearer understanding of their needs.
CHALLENGES
1.
Adding items to cart was time consuming and cumbersome
What we learned
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Users without barcode scanners (those that sell services, food items, tickets, etc) found the checkout process slow because adding an item required multiple steps.
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Screens took 2–5 seconds to load, slowing down transactions.
How we solved it
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Introduced a quick-add feature, allowing users to add items with one click.
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Optimised the item spotlight from a pop up to a drawer in order to have a less jarring experience
2.
Storefront organisation (or lack-thereof) was frustrating
What we learned
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Users struggled with a cluttered POS storefront because there was no way to categorise items.
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Many didn’t use item images, but had no option to remove them, making the layout overwhelming.
How we solved it
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Introduced an intermediary solution to help users organise items within their inventory system.
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Added an option to remove images, making the storefront cleaner for those who prefer text-based navigation.
USER INTERVIEWS
User insight: food seller
We interviewed a small business owner who sells curated gift packages of dried fruits, nuts, craft beers, and wines. Their primary frustration was the lack of category support in the inventory system, which created two problems:
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Difficulty organising products on the POS store screen
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Challenges integrating with third-party delivery platforms (Wolt, Tenbis) and e-commerce solutions (Shopify)
This feedback highlighted how organisational limitations affected not just in-store operations but also their entire digital ecosystem.
User insight: custom home decor seller
Another user owns a custom home decor store and has many different categories in her store; furniture, faux bouquets, paintings, and more.
She was frustrated by the lack of inventory and storefront organisation and by the lengthy process of adding items to her cart due to loading times.
When having a customer with a big order, it could take up to a minute selecting items and placing them in the cart.
USER PERSONA
Who exactly is the iCount POS user?
iCount is the second most popular SaaS online accounting system in Israel, serving a diverse user base across different ages, locations, business types, and tech proficiency levels. However, since POS is a face-to-face tool, our client base is primarily brick-and-mortar businesses. Through interviews with multiple users, I developed a clear user persona for our typical POS user:
PROJECT CONSTRAINTS
Understanding what we can and can't do
The ideal solution - implementing full category trees in iCount's inventory system - would have required a complete system overhaul. Given our limited development resources, we needed a more feasible approach. We proposed and implemented a 'types' field in the inventory system as a practical compromise. This allowed users to classify and sort items by at least one category, significantly improving organisation without requiring extensive backend redevelopment.
Below is a screenshot from our desktop system inventory page where the Types categorisation has been added.
RESEARCH
Item spotlight: Sheet/drawer vs. pop up
Industry analysis: I examined leading POS tablet applications including Hike POS, Square POS, and Fresha, and found they increasingly use sheet/drawer interfaces rather than full-screen popups. This design pattern appears across various sections of these apps, suggesting an industry best practice for contextual information display.
The Nielsen Norman Group defines sheets as elements "used to present extra information, contextual controls, or both."
In the context of a POS storefront, employing a sheet for an item spotlight offers several benefits over a full-screen popup:
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Enhanced user experience: Sheets provide a smoother, less disruptive transition compared to full-screen popups.
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Contextual awareness: Users maintain visibility of the store screen, allowing them to reference the main interface while interacting with the sheet's content.
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Efficient navigation: The sheet interface enables users to swiftly access different functions without losing their place in the transaction process.
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Improved agility: Users can effortlessly alternate between the sheet and the store screen, offering greater flexibility than transitioning between a full-page popup and the main interface.
COMPETITOR ANALYSIS
Hike POS
Square POS - restaraunts
Square POS - retail
Fresha POS
USER FLOWS + INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE
Existing user flow
I started out by mapping the existing user flow. Currently the user can only add an item to the cart by bringing up the item spotlight. This takes between 2-4 seconds to load, the price field is in focus, and the keyboard is active - this means that it is hiding multiple sections of the item spotlight such as the image carousel, warehouse location, and barcode number. If the user simply wants to add an item to the cart, the keyboard is redundant - however in most cases the user will instinctively close the keyboard before clicking on the CTA “Add to cart”. The whole process can take between 5-10 seconds.
New user flow
In order to save our users both time and frustration, I:
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Added a sorting feature - allowing users to organise their storefront by item type.
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Designed a 'quick add' flow enabling users to add items directly from the store screen without loading the item spotlight - reducing the transaction time from 5-6 seconds to under 1 second per item.
Information architecture
Taking the existing flow and the new features and functions I wanted to add, I mapped out the storefront’s I.A, as pictured below:
LOWFI WIREFRAMES
Storefront lowfi wireframes
Item spotlight lowfi wireframes
HIGHFI WIREFRAMES
Storefront highfi wireframes
Item spotlight and add an item manually drawer
Item spotlight drawer
Add an item manually drawer
FINAL DESIGNS
A more organised storefront
Before
❌ No way to organise the storefront, only endless scrolling
❌ Item names truncate after 17 characters, making longer names unreadable.
Now
✅ The storefront is able to be sorted according to types - this makes it easier for the users to find specific items.
✅ More room for the item name - up to 40 characters
Organise the storefront according to type categories
Before
❌ No way to organise the storefront, only endless scrolling
Now
✅ Users can categorise their storefront effortlessly. They can add as many types as needed, and when the list grows, a new drawer allows for seamless browsing and quick searches.
Quick add to cart
Before
❌ Average time of 5-6 seconds to add items to cart
❌ Item names truncate after 17 characters, making longer names unreadable.
Now
✅ One click and less than one second to add an item to cart
✅ Option to remove images from the item cards, allowing for a 58 character name and more items on the store front screen
A redesigned item spotlight
Before
❌ Item spotlight could take up to 4 seconds to load
❌ The keyboard is active automatically - the user instinctively lowers it before clicking on “Add to cart”
❌ The item spotlight is messy and disorganised - a lot of confusion where to look
Now
✅ Optimised the backend system and halved loading times - it now takes a maximum of 2 seconds
✅ The item spotlight is designed to follow the Z-pattern eye-tracking common in interactive interfaces, naturally guiding users through key information. They begin with the item name and price, make a quick visual pass over the images, and ultimately land on the quantity picker—the primary call to action if they want to add more than one item. The quantity picker is also a text field in case the user wants to add a large quantity,
CASE STUDY RETROSPECTIVE
Key trade-offs and constraints
1.
Constraint: Limited development resources.
Impact: The ideal solution (full category trees in inventory system) would require complete system overhaul.
Decision: Implemented a practical 'types' field compromise that allowed single-category classification while maintaining development feasibility.
2.
Constraint: Backend performance limitations.
Impact: Item spotlight loading took 2-5 seconds, significantly slowing transactions.
Decision: Redesigned from popup to drawer interface and optimized backend to halve loading times (max 2 seconds) while introducing quick-add functionality.
3.
Constraint: Diverse user base tech proficiency.
Impact: Users ranged from tech-savvy to tech-illiterate across different business types.
Decision: Prioritised intuitive design patterns following Z-pattern eye-tracking and industry standards from Square POS, Hike POS, ensuring accessibility for all skill levels.
During the POS redesign, we ran into a few key constraints that shaped the way we approached the solution. With limited dev resources, we had to find a workable alternative to a full inventory overhaul - so we introduced a simple 'types' field to keep things manageable. Slow backend performance meant we needed to rethink how items loaded during a sale, which led to a faster, drawer-style interface. And because our users varied widely in tech comfort, we leaned into clear, familiar patterns to make sure the system felt easy and intuitive for everyone.
I've summarised our key constraints, impacts, and decisions in the following section:
Constraint | Impact | Decision |
|---|---|---|
Limited development resources | The ideal solution (full category trees in inventory system) would require complete system overhaul | Implemented a practical 'types' field compromise that allowed single-category classification while maintaining development feasibility |
Backend performance limitations | Item spotlight loading took 2-5 seconds, significantly slowing transactions | Redesigned from popup to drawer interface and optimised backend to halve loading times (max 2 seconds) while introducing quick-add functionality |
Diverse user base tech proficiency | Users ranged from tech-savvy to tech-illiterate across different business types | Prioritised intuitive design patterns following Z-pattern eye-tracking and industry standards from Square POS, Hike POS, ensuring accessibility for all skill levels |
Future development
This redesign had a limited scope due to development and timeline resources, but ideally I would also like to:
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Implement the side sheet interaction throughout the whole app. This would include in the inventory; adding, editing, and viewing items, in the sales section; viewing orders and receipts, and in the reports (currently marked for future dev); viewing the past daily reports.
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Redesign our system inventory and include category trees and item variants to address the compatibility issues with Shopify and Woocommerce.
While interviewing users specifically for POS feedback, we unintentionally uncovered issues in other areas of the system -a reminder of how interconnected and dynamic our platform truly is. This gave us a great direction to consider while planning our roadmap.