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About BNP Paribas's Horrid Easy Banking app

A while ago I wrote about the BNP Paribas Easy Banking app for iPhone and how it has different password input validation than the input field on their website for Belgian customers.

After using the app I thought I should write about it some more. I care very much for details in a product, especially if I know the producer of the app has the means to put in the effort of taking care of every little thing. BNP Paribas is a bank, they surely have a lot of money. The problem is of course that they're a bank. That means they move at glacial speeds when it comes to technology. This has always been common knowledge but it's not just a myth, it's true as I know someone who works there as a developer.

BNP Paribas is a French bank, that implies their English is abysmal. This too, is common knowledge. Here's one example.

"This is your first time connexion"? Are they serious? Things like that irk me. But we're not done yet, here's the next screenshot.

"Please send once an empty texte message..." That is so French (they even spelled "text" in French) it's hiliarous. The whole explanation does not make much sense either. Also, there are arrows on the bottom that don't do anything. There is no previous or next page. You could argue that they're greyed out and that they'll become active as soon as there is a page to switch back to. I've looked through the app and found a section where there's more navigation possible. When on the home-screen, you can try and tap on the hard-to-hit "Troubles signing in?" text which does not look like a link or a button at all. When tapping it you end up at the professionally named "faq logon" section where UI atrocities like this take place.

I can't find a fitting description here. Do the BNP Paribas developers even know what they're doing? Is there anyone in charge of UX? I think it's safe to say that, seeing as we're discussing a bank here, there is no-one in charge of design and UX. The page has a back button, awkwardly placed underneat the "Close" button... and the arrow-keys on the bottom are still showing and still greyed out. I haven't found a place where they have a purpose. It's a sad state of affairs and these are just three examples, there are more.
Have you noticed how, in the screenshots, the app is not optimized for iPhone 5? I happen to have one, and I'm sure a lot of their best clients carry do too. The iPhone 5's been out for almost half a year now, it wouldn't be a bad idea to cater to their clientele.
BNP Paribas Belgium, if you happen to read this...

  • Please, have your app proofread by someone who's a better English speaker.
  • Don't prompt us about our apps being in Dutch because our "contract" is in Dutch and then show an English user interface. If you want to do it right you have us set the language in the app.
  • Upon starting the app we do not need a seven second animation of the BNP Paribas logo. We just want to get stuff done.
  • Optimize the Easybanking app for the iPhone 5. You make yourself look bad not doing it.