24h Hackathon (British Airways)
Encouraging customers to book flights using their travel eVouchers
My Role
UX Research
UX & UI Design
Project Timeline
24 Hours
Tools
Figma, Photoshop, Illustrator
Project Overview
Background Context
British Airways is a global airline, bringing people, places and diverse cultures closer together for more than 100 years. British Airways customers whose flights or holidays were delayed or cancelled in 2020-21 could exchange their payment for a voucher to use at a later time. Since 2020, many travel vouchers issues have gone unused.
The Problem
Large number of unused vouchers that were issued in 2020-2021. The company intends to reduce the amount of unused vouchers by encouraging customers to use them. This would cover all flights globally and customers will not be able to redeem vouchers for BA holidays. The key outlines involves encouraging customers to purchase new flights to travel anywhere around the world, using the existing vouchers under their name.
The Solutions
By converting the e-vouchers to e-cards, it provides a smoother experience for users to apply them when purchasing their flights whilst also creating a novelty connection with the card as it is fully customisable to their liking and linked to their British Airways accounts.
Pain Point
Forgetting to use their e-vouchers
due to low retention rate
User
Young solo travellers
are the primary users, with a focus on Gen-Z and Millenials
Goal
Encourage users to use their e-vouchers
so that they don't forget before the vouchers expire.
British Airways is looking for opportunities to encourage their customers to use their travel vouchers before they expire, as many are still left unused years later.
The Challenge
Due to the strict time restriction, the team first listed specific constraints that would outline our project. By knowing the team’s capabilities and limits at producing certain deliverables, we have a realistic understanding of what we can achieve in the allotted timeframe.
Our Approach
Our Software Engineers highlighted that they could only realistically create a website within the 24-hour timeframe.
Our Data Scientists informed us that there is limited access to British Airways’ public datasets.
Our Goal
Increase the number of customers using their soon-to-be expired e-vouchers. To do this, we looked at new ways to ensure e-vouchers are more readily applicable for payment options
Our team of Data Scientists alongside the Product Designers collaborated to find relevant findings related to customers’ experience purchasing flights and using e-vouchers. From this we could make high-level assumptions of our target users.
Research Insights
Desktop is key
90%
of customers booked flights on desktops
59%
of millennials had ever shopped for a flight on their phones
I use my iPhone for most of my internet access. But if I need to do some serious researching and price comparison, I will always wait until I have my laptop available.
Key Target Users
Using our insights, we identified who our users should be. From the data gathered by the Data Scientists and our initial research, we found high-level insights.
Users
25-34 year old solo travellers
62.7%
of BA customers are solo travellers
1 in 5
of 16-34 year olds have unused expired vouchers
19%
of 25-34 year olds said they had travelled by themselves
Only 15% of bookings get completed
due to booking abandonment
But why?
Checkout process is too long
Customers had to enter too much information
Concerns over website security
Before coming with possible solutions, we decided to look at two competitors’ websites and identify how they handle customer e-vouchers. From evaluating both sites, we discovered some key areas to consider. We decided on Icelandic Air and Emirates as they were not sister companies or affiliated with British Airways. They both also serve internationally at various scales, making them good case study references.
Key Competitor's Analysis
Emirates
The e-voucher section was quite difficult to locate when scrolling quickly through the process.
The instructions to apply the e-voucher is more detailed. However, this may confuse the users as the layout is not as cohesive and jumbled.
There is an extra step to applying the voucher compared to Icelandic Air, making it more difficult to use.
Icelandic Air
The option to use e-vouchers is clearly visible for the users and is easy to understand.
The instructions are easy to follow and distraction-free from other actions.
The webpage is simplified for the users to ensure there is no cognitive overload.
How Might We...
encourage younger solo travellers to book flights for their weekend trips using their travel e-voucher?
We did an audit of BA’s existing website and booking process to identify any areas of intervention we could take. We needed to ensure any solutions don’t hinder the existing booking process as there is already an existing mental model from BA customers.
British Airways Site Audit
The Solution
Our goal was to create a lasting connection between British Airways and it’s customers by streamlining the experience of e-voucher usage for their flight bookings. By doing so, customers are reminded and encouraged to use their e-vouchers before they expire.
Reminder
Customers are sent an email to link their eVoucher codes to their accounts to transfer the code to an e-card.
Updated home page to increase alert rate
The home page is the start of the user journey, so it's important to create a strong first impression to alert customers.
For those who missed the email reminder, this was the most ideal solution to gain their attention.
Personalisation
Inspired by British Airways’ Executive Club cards, customers can customise their cards for a more personal connection to the item rather than an easily forgettable generic email code.
Easy access
Customers can pay using the card at the click of a button instead of typing a code. It is easily visible at the checkout page for quick access.
Add to e-wallet
E-cards can be added to the e-wallet to use if purchasing flights via a mobile device.
Closing Thoughts
Key Takeaways
It was very insightful and rewarding to be able to work on a brief with a real-life problem. Working within a tight timeframe taught me to work and communicate with other team members, and understanding how they work. Working around each disciplines constraints proved to be a challenging task, which made me aware of implementing a product that was both creative but fundamentally practical to users – it needed to be user-centric whilst ensuring viability for both clients and stakeholders.
What went well?
I really enjoyed working in collaboration with the other disciplines to see how each other’s work influences the overall project. I was extremely proud of the team’s perseverance and ambition to pitch a creative solution that tackled the users’ needs and created an interactive and personal connection with the users, which was well received by other teams and the British Airways judging panel.
What could have been better?
Due to the nature of the brief and its time constraint, we encountered difficulties prioritising certain tasks and underestimating the time taken to complete certain deliverables. Reflecting on the experience, it may have been better to delegate one leader that oversee all activity instead of three leaders (from each discipline).
