Singapore Airlines
Express Booking
xxx
TEAM
2 x UX Strategists, 1 x UI Designer
1 x Product Manager
1 x Copywriter
CONTRIBUTIONS
Led all product design related activities
Stakeholder management
Check out the express booking feature on the live site.
Project Overview
The existing 5-step flight booking flow, while allowing customers to fully customise their booking, is a hassle for frequent fliers as they have to select the same options repeatedly to book the flights that they always fly on. This led to the need of a more streamlined booking process for frequent fliers to book easier and faster.
Objective
xxx
Challenges
Design a booking experience that strikes a good balance between simplicity and flexibility. We want to avoid overwhelming users with too many unnecessary options, but still want to provide some extent of flexibility
Convince stakeholders to agree to the removal of some ancillary offerings in the new booking flow
To understand and design around the backend technical constrains that might affect the booking experience
Project details
1. User research
We began by understanding which factors (fare, ticket flexibility, seats) are more important to our frequent flier members when it comes to booking a flight. To find out, we ran an online survey with over 2,000 frequent flier members that do repeat travels to the same destination(s).
From the findings, we found out that these are the most important factors:
Low fare
Seat preferences
Ticket flexibility and upgradability
Options that are less important and rarely considered during booking:
Additional baggage
Wi-Fi
Hotels
Cars
Travel insurance
2. Wireframing and testing
With that understanding, I reduced the options from our existing booking flow to the most essential ones. After multiple iterations of wireframing the new booking flow, we put it in front of our users to see what they think.
V1 wireframes
We initially tested a version where users needed to go though an initial set up flow to save their credit card details for faster payment and set up their travel profiles based on flight timings and seats preferences.
They will then apply a selected profile when they start booking and the system will then make selections based on the presets of the profile.
Observations on the set up steps
Observations on the booking flow
Step 1: Set up a default payment card
Most users understood the travel profile set up step
A few users felt uncomfortable with saving their credit card details before they make a booking
Step 2: Creating a preference profile
Some users stated that their preferred flight timing would differ depending on their destination.
By pre-defining a specific flight timing per profile, that would mean they had to create multiple profiles
Turning on Express Booking from the Booking Widget
Users were able to turn on Express Booking and selecting a profile from the booking widget
Review and pay page
Users were unsure of how to change their flights should the pre-selected ones were not suitable
Users mentioned that they would like to see the actual location of the pre-selected seats
All users said that they do not buy travel insurance from the airline because they are either covered by their workplace or they have an annual insurance plan
V2 wireframes
With the insight and feedback from the testing, I tweaked the designs
Design changes:
Removing the setup screens to lower the barrier of entry, so that users can start using the feature right away. Instead of depending the travel profiles that users have to setup, we use various data points to inform the pre-selections.
Allowing users to change the fare type on the same page
Making the alternate flight options more visible and easily accessible without having to bring users to another page
Displaying the seat location upfront
Grouping the passenger details section to make it easier to read
Removing the option to purchase travel insurance
Launch
The Express Booking flow was launched as a beta feature on singaporeair.com.
Users can enable Express Booking on the booking widget
By leveraging on the past booking data of our frequent flier members, we are able to pre-select options for them in the Express Booking flow while providing the flexibility for them to make any necessary changes.
Outcome
Stats
~30% ⬇️
in feedback sent to unmonitored mailboxes
~70% ⬇️
feedback rerouting required
55% ⬇️
time required to complete the form
3,200+
feedback received in the 1st month after launch
Feedback from the customers
“I’ve noticed that you have improved the feedback form. It used to be very difficult to use but the new one is very user-friendly!”
“This feedback form is quite easy to use. It is less overwhelming. I like that it pre-populates my flights so that I don’t have to enter them manually, saving me a lot of time.”