Design | Quirks & foibles
These days, nearly everything is made accessible by mobile app or website— we’re all about instant gratification. We need, want, and expect everything at our fingertips. Contrary to popular belief, this isn’t just a generational thing, or even a cultural thing— the use of technology is ubiquitous across the globe, and mobile phones, apps, and the internet are used by people of all ages and backgrounds. One thing nearly all users have in common is the need to stay connected to the world in some way (be that with family, friends, work, or what have you), and the desire for easy, fast, and simple access to what they want.
In this post, I’ll explore some personal experiences I’ve had with certain apps or websites that have frustrated me as a user, and throw out some ideas for improvement.
“I want it now!”
One user experience/problem I’ve encountered recently (as have others I know) and continuously is: while shopping online or about to purchase food for delivery online — you pick everything you want, add it to your cart, navigate to the checkout page, enter in all your credit-card information, then end up deciding to add or subtract an item from your cart. You go back to continue shopping, and when you return to the checkout, your credit-card info was not saved; you have to re-enter everything again, even your address, email, and phone number. This is a minor frustration/annoyance, but it can have a larger impact on your overall satisfaction with an app or website.
A way to improve upon this experience would be to have your app/website save a user’s entered information so when they navigate away and back to the page, they don’t have to spend time and energy re-entering information, and their order can be on its way that much faster. To the user, every second counts.
Another user experience frustration I’ve encountered frequently is when the Uber app is not up-to-speed with the driver’s accurate location and presumed arrival time. Often it will say the driver is arriving when they are actually still quite a ways away (e.g. “Your Uber is arriving” when they are actually still 6 minutes down the block). Also, when you open the app and try to set the location, it gives you the option to “Go to pin,” which is your assumed current location. It’s easy and understandable for a user to assume the app knows their location, yet sometimes when the driver arrives and calls, both the user and the driver realize they’re not in the right spot because the pin was inaccurate.
Obviously each app has its quirks, but it would be immensely helpful to the user for Uber to fine-tune its GPS accuracy (drivers often have to ask the rider for directions as well, or they go the wrong way, or do not understand the route — this makes it difficult for both the driver and the passenger). Part of Uber’s charm has always been that you don’t need to give directions; the GPS is supposed to do that for you. More accurate GPS tracking would be beneficial to all who use the application.
The other experience that comes to mind that has bugged me as a user is that when opening particular apps, the landing page/opening animation takes a long time to complete and to take me to the actual app. Certain apps can take 10–20 seconds to open; one in particular (Layout app for Instagram) tells you how to use the app and explains its features every time you open it. This is obviously unnecessary to explain and demonstrate every single time a user opens the app.
It would be helpful to decrease the app’s opening time and/or allow you to skip through opening animations that you’ve already seen, absorbed, and understand.
Obviously, as users we need to allow technology the time it needs to advance. The industry may be rapidly expanding, but it does take some time for technology’s developments to catch up to the speed of the average human mind. We are constantly being stimulated by outside factors, and technology is an integral part of practically everything we experience. But when we take a break from switching screens, look around, and breathe, it’s easy to see just how far we have truly come, and exciting and inspiring to think about what ground we still have to cover and explore.
