SiteMinder Automated Payments

SiteMinder Automated Payments - End-to-end UX and UI enhancements

Customer problem

Customers were unable to validate guest credit cards in advance, and there is a lot of time spent manually processing deposits and final payments.

Business goals

To increase revenue through SiteMinder Payments, by allowing users to set up auto payments, which SiteMinder collects a commission, and offer a way for users to create payment rules, that is intuitive and easy to use, and doesn’t require to user to seek help from support.

The challenge

Create an intuitive, easy-to-use, online tool for hoteliers to set up and manage automated payments, which accommodates their specific requirements, improves their payments workflow, and instills trust and confidence.

My approach

I was brought into the project by the Product Director, tasked with turning an early-stage MVP into a full fledged feature which was fit more market release. My process included reviewing the existing research and MVP solution, recommending and implementing enhancements to the UX and UI, and conducting usability testing on the end-to-end journey.

Empathising with the customer

Focus
Stakeholder meetings. "What are we trying to achieve with this project for our users?"
Review existing research and documentation
Review MVP solution
Outputs
A clear understanding of business problems, customer pain points and stakeholder expectations
A clear understanding of the technical constraints

Ideating enhancements to UX and UI

Focus
Perform an audit of the MVP solution
Explore opportunities to improve the UX of the automated payments flow
Team alignment on a proposed UX enhancements
Outputs
Recommendations for improvements to the UX and UI

Prototyping the enhancements

Focus
Designing the UX and UI enhancements
Addressing any additional UX issues that arise
Going wide on design, testing out different patterns and interactions
Outputs
UX enhancements the team is happy to proceed to customer research with
Prototypes ready for customer research

Testing with customers

Focus
Validating the UX enhancements
Identifying gaps in comprehension
Discovering usability issues
Learning customer needs
Process
Identify and agree on learning objectives with the product team
Write assumptions and hypotheses based on the UX enhancements
Create the task guide for users to complete during testing
Modify prototype so that it presents opportunities to test hypothesis
Conduct usability testing interviews with customers
Perform synthesis and extract insights and recommendations
Who I tested with
Performing synthesis
Extracting the insights

Designing the final UI

Focus
Implementing design updates based on research discoveries
Outputs
High fidelity prototype
Stakeholders onboard with enhanced designs
Documentation and design solutions for edgecases and error states
Entry points and help material
Rule creation wizard
Rule management

Handover and developer support

Focus
Setting up the engineering and QA teams with what they need to effectively build, test and deliver the new release
Outputs
Designs uploaded to Zeplin
Collaborate with design system team on new components
Accompanying documentation where needed