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Building required checks into the customer journey

Walter's prior experience · Bitbuy · Product Manager, 2021–22

The situation

Bitbuy had to collect identity and transfer information as a regulated exchange, while competing for customers accustomed to simple crypto transactions. The product challenge was to meet those obligations without turning sign-up and every transfer into a long compliance form.

The key judgment

Separate what the rule requires from the steps a process happens to impose. Collect the necessary information when it is needed, reuse it where possible, and route exceptions to people for review.

What Walter did

  • Worked with compliance to identify the information required for onboarding, then simplified how customers provided it.
  • Introduced behaviour analysis that revealed unexpected drop-off at address entry. The team added address lookup.
  • Designed a recipient flow that captures details once and lets customers select a saved recipient on later transfers.
  • Worked with engineering, support and compliance on identity verification and wallet screening, with unclear or flagged cases directed to human review.

What happened, and the limits

KYC onboarding, Travel Rule, screening and identity-verification features shipped, built with compliance and engineering. They became part of how Bitbuy met its obligations as a registered platform.

The lesson Walter carries forward: meet the requirement with the least the customer has to do. Agree what the rule actually needs, then design around what the person is trying to do. He applies the same test to review steps and controls in operational AI work at Maple Spark Labs.

This was Walter's work at Bitbuy, not a Maple Spark Labs engagement or an AI implementation. It does not imply any endorsement by Bitbuy.

Bitbuy's December 2021 announcement (opens in a new tab) describes its registrations with securities regulators and FINTRAC, not Walter's role.

Have a workflow with checks like these? Ways to work with us
Building required checks into the customer journeySimplified, illustrative customer journey; not a Bitbuy screen.
  1. Sign up
    Only the details the rules require.
  2. Verify identity
    ID and liveness check; anything unclear goes to manual review.
  3. Add a recipient
    Travel Rule details, captured once.
  4. Send again
    The saved recipient is reused, not re-entered.

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