Last week, I made several changes to my online banking setup in an effort to streamline and simplify things. For the most part, these changes consisted of finding the appropriate Edit button or link, and then modifying the desired values. However, not every change was quite so straightforward.

In a few cases, I didn’t see an Edit button next to the setting I wanted to change. I knew where it was supposed to be, since most of the other settings had the link present. But no matter how many times I checked, I couldn’t figure out how to change the value online.

I ended up calling the bank, and they made the change for me. Apparently, there was no way that I could have accomplished the same thing online. That’s all fine and good, but I shouldn’t have had to spend so much time figuring that out on my own.

Ideally, the online banking site would have an Edit button or link for every setting that a customer might want to change. Then, for the settings that can’t be changed online, clicking on the link would bring up a screen explaining just that, along with instructions about how to complete the task by phone or another communication channel. That way, customers won’t have to waste their time looking for a feature that simply isn’t there, and the customer service team won’t have to deal with already-irate people when they inevitably call in to make the change.