One of the many things that occurs in the life of a User Experience designer is the need to justify our advocacy, and ask the obvious questions that come our way: Why is design important? Why should the experience be a point of focus? Why fix something that isn’t (perceived to be) broken?
Thankfully, companies like Apple have provided valuable case studies that we can reference, allowing us to point to organizations that make UX a focal point of their product design life-cycle. I have been fortunate enough to work at a company that support design efforts and user research, and have had the good graces to take advantage of such support to do good work. For example, last year I was the user experience designer on an effort to increase understanding and adoption of on-line bill payment and the use of what was called (at the time) “e-bills.” We were able, through extensive design testing and user research, to improve the understanding of this offering.
And the results… well, I’ll let the press release speak for itself:
| Consumers Activate Electronic Bills at Significantly Higher Rate with Latest Version of Award-Winning CheckFree Web RXPSM
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| Brookfield, Wis. Fiserv, Inc. (NASDAQ: FISV), a leading provider of information technology services to the financial industry, announced today that its financial institution customers have significantly increased their e-bill (electronic bill) activation rates in the six months since implementing the most recent upgrade of Fiserv’s CheckFree Web RXPSM. E-bills are online versions of paper bills that are securely delivered directly to a financial institution’s or billing company’s website.
As a result of enhancements delivered with the CheckFree Web RXP Feature Pack 1 release, consumer e-bill activations jumped by 145 percent in the first week following the delivery of the feature pack to Fiserv’s bank and credit union customers, according to an analysis of transactions from five of Fiserv’s major financial institution customers. As of December 31, 2008, the average e-bill activation rate had stabilized at a 30 percent higher level than the rate recorded in the two months prior to the delivery of Feature Pack 1. In addition, the volume of e-bill activation requests per consumer jumped by 34 percent in the week immediately after the Feature Pack 1 release, meaning more consumers signed up for multiple e-bills. By December 31, 2008, the volume of e-bill activation requests per consumer had stabilized at a10 percent higher level than the pre-Feature Pack 1 rate. “These positive results demonstrate that CheckFree Web RXP’s user-friendly interface is driving more consumers to adopt e-bills and online bill payment as faster, more convenient ways to manage their monthly financial obligations. Our research has repeatedly shown that consumers who receive e-bills and pay their bills online are more loyal and valuable to our financial institution customers,” said Todd Lesher, division president, Fiserv Electronic Banking Services. “At Fiserv, we continue to optimize the online channel to enable our financial institution clients to develop deeper, more profitable relationships with their customers.” Feature Pack 1 of CheckFree Web RXP was rolled out simultaneously to more than 2,200 financial institutions on July 20, 2008. The unique feature pack upgrade process delivers new functionality to financial institutions simultaneously, in real time, thus eliminating the need for a more traditional and time-consuming migration process to a new product version. The latest version of Fiserv’s award-winning electronic billing and payment service incorporates user interface and functional enhancements based on extensive consumer research and usability testing. CheckFree Web RXP streamlines the e-bill enrollment process by presenting consumers with a complete list of all the secure e-bills they can sign-up to receive and view at their financial institution website. E-bill activation is also prominently promoted throughout the Rich Internet Application and on the Payment Assistant, which contains messaging and a thumbnail image that assures consumers they will access an electronic version of the same detailed bill that they now receive in the mail. CheckFree Web RXP processes more bill payments and more consumer e-bills than any other electronic billing and payment service. It earned the highest ranking of any product on the Bank Technology News Innovators 2007 list. |