Interactive Voice Response (IVR) Redesign

Air Miles, 2016

IVR technology can be incredibly complex. These complexities, however, are providing more and more possibilities in the realm of voice interaction design. This project deals with the redesign of an IVR system and incorporates speech technology to allow for voice inputs to make commands/move through the experience. The result of this redesign can be heard by calling: 1-888-AIR-MILES 

Business Problem

Calls to the customer care centre (call centre) were continuing to exceed sustainable volumes and calls that could be handled by the self-serve options were still reaching agents. The business required a solution that ensured callers’ inquiries were accurately addressed while reducing calls to the call centre.

Approach

I joined forces with a UX Designer as the lead Researcher on the project. We began by researching standard practices for voice interaction in an IVR system. We followed with a competitive analysis of Interactive Voice Response Systems from a variety of companies. As part of this discovery phase, I prepared and ran usability studies with AIR MILES Collectors on the current IVR experience to better understand where callers might be encountering confusion or complications.

An in-progress calling flow for the  IVR redesign.

Next up

We spent time analyzing the content that had to be included in the IVR system and began to define an information architecture for it based on the best practices we had learnt earlier. After several meetings with those who understood the AIR MILES program like the back of their hand (to ensure all information the business required was included), we had a working flow of the new IVR system.

To ensure that the logic contained no holes, I prepared a usability testing project to be run with several users of the program. By preparing a script and rigging up a video call pointed at a mobile phone, I was able to play the part of the IVR voice while a colleague guided participants through the testing session.

A usability test allowed me to see how a caller would behave and react to the prompts and information being presented. With a usability test, I was also able to see which numbers the participants pressed and how long it would take them to make a decision. I was able to measure comprehension by seeing how many times they required the instructions to be repeated.

Results

The usability test yielded a few comprehension issues. We were able to adjust the flow so the user wouldn’t be overwhelmed with too much information at once. One complication that arose during testing was that when the caller is asked to enter their birthdate, the caller would become confused about which format to use and when to enter the information. This was something we learned from and improved on by breaking the experience down into more steps so that the caller was only inputting one set of numbers (such as their birth month) at once.

Next Steps

Following the completion of the design, I remained as a consultant on the project. The branding phase improved the wording of the IVR script so that it better aligned with the company brand. My role was to ensure that this new wording did not conflict with any learned best practices or user feedback that was gathered. I remained on the project while consulting with the third party that would implement the IVR, again to ensure that the needs of the users were not being compromised in any way.