Designing a smarter travel savings experience
Autopilot watches booked flights and claims the difference when fares drop. As UI and UX lead, I designed the iOS app that makes automated savings feel simple and trustworthy.
iOS App
UI and UX Lead
Fintech for Travel
~50%
Of flights drop after booking
$20
Smallest drop Autopilot claims
25%
Fee, only when you save
10 sec
To check a trip for savings
Role
UI and UX Lead
Scope
Research, UX and UI
Platform
iOS, dark and light mode
Company
Autopilot, New York
The problem: fares drop after people book
You booked on Tuesday. The fare dropped on Thursday. Airlines will honor the lower price, but only if you notice in time, know the rules and ask. Almost nobody does, so the difference quietly stays with the airline.
How might we help travelers keep the savings they are owed, without adding any work to their trip?
Research: how travelers feel after booking
Competitor analysis
How travel apps show savings
Journey mapping
From booking to boarding
Polls and follow ups
Frequent flyers in my network
Pain point mapping
Where trust breaks down
What other travel apps do
Travel apps, fare trackers and airline sites
01
Most tools optimize the search before booking, not after it.
02
Post booking savings flows are unclear, manual or hidden.
03
Trust depends on being clear about what happens to your ticket.
What I asked travelers
Frequent flyers, through polls and follow up calls
“
When do you book, and what worries you after you pay?
“
Did you know fares can drop after you buy?
“
What stops you from claiming credit when they do?
How it works: add, track, save
A complex repricing backend, turned into three steps a traveler never has to think about twice.
Key design decisions
Show every automated step
The tension
The more Autopilot did silently, the less people trusted it with their flights, inbox and payments.
What I chose
Every automated step got a visible, plain language state: a live fare chart, a clear repricing switch and an activity timeline.
Make it clear the flight stays the same
The tension
People assumed saving money meant rebooking, losing their seat or changing times.
What I chose
Every saving leads with the original price and what they paid, right above the untouched flight details.
Explain pricing up front
The tension
A commission model is easy to distrust when it appears at the wrong moment.
What I chose
Pricing sits up front: free until Autopilot saves you money, with a savings calculator that shows the math.
The final design
Bookings, upgrade alerts, travelers and savings, designed in dark and light mode.
Dark and light mode
Results
$15M
Funding raised to scale post booking savings
$1,460
Saved on a single family trip
3
National features: GMA, CBS and The New York Times
“Great experience working with Zuraiz! He delivered the content on time and greatly exceeded my expectations.”
Sam Hollander
CEO, Autopilot
Live on iOS
In dark and light mode
$15M raised
To scale post booking savings
In the press
Good Morning America, CBS and The New York Times
What I learned
Autopilot’s value comes from doing complex work for people, but every step still had to feel understandable. Nobody hands over their flights, inbox and card to a black box.
The best moments in the app are the quiet ones: a notification that says you saved money, and a screen that proves nothing else changed.
“Automation works best when people feel both supported and in control.”
/ More work
More case studies
