Relationship goals in Travel Industry — UX Case Study of Designing Cancellation Policies
Building better relationships with our customers to ensure guilt-free break-ups
In the early 2020s, COVID-19 struck the world. The travel sector had to face an angry horde of anxious customers wanting to change and cancel their bookings. The load on the customer care teams was immense. The pandemic blindsided us and thrusted upon us numerous complex issues, for which there were no immediate fixes. But the MakeMyTrip team has left no stone unturned in trying to find common ground and makes this experience hassle-free for the consumers while backing our suppliers.
It became imperative for us, as a team, to remain clear and honest with our users, so that they don’t feel cheated. Think about relationships. To avoid an ugly break up, it’s best to be upfront and honest with each other. In the same way, as designers, we need to be transparent with our user. It’s natural to feel cheated if one doesn’t know the entire deal before diving in.
Being transparent with the cancellation policy is the best policy
Beware the angry customer — they can go on a rampage ranging from dialling customer support, complaining on social media, down-rating your app, and creating an overall bad impression of your brand on social media and other channels.
MMT’s Holidays line of business has its own complexity as the packages are created with a combination of Flights, Hotels, Activities and transfers. Each inclusion comes with its own cancellation nuances.
Which is why it’s important that the users can easily find your Cancellation Policy on the website or app. We had to make sure it’s easy to locate and understand.
Defining the problem
For any relationship to work, communication is key. Traditionally, cancellation policies came in long, static, textual, bullet-point formats where everything looks the same.
The aim was to clearly highlight cancellation policy while giving the user an easy way to compare between plans; thereby improving the overall funnel hygiene.
Sometimes an amicable divorce rests on the shoulders of a solid pre-nuptial agreement. Before you break up, it’s important to talk about who keeps the dog and who gets the Netflix account. Before you book with MakeMyTrip, you should know what you’ll be getting back.
Objectives
- Display different kinds of protection plans that a user could pick from
- Pre-define and convey the difference between date change and cancellation to avoid confusion
- Clearly highlight the default plan selected
Process
Defining structure:
As the components were many we decided to have dates as a fixed element to help users compare between the policies and protection plans.
Exploration:
Experimented with different ways of approaching the design e.g. Rate plan, Timeline view, Tabular representation etc
Implementation:
Decided the policy would be displayed at various stages of the user journey like on the Details page, Review Page, Thank-you page, and Final Quotation — making sure it’s not missed.
Moving towards the Final
The right words of affirmation are different for everyone; but sometimes to save a relationship one should do what the other person wants. Keeping that in mind, we tried to give our users what they were asking for too.
The final design was a combination of the timeline view with a tabular comparison of benefits.
Color-coding the UI:
We used a visual language that emotionally resonates with users — red for the worst, green for the best, and yellow for… meh. If only real people came with easily identifiable colours too — would have saved us a lot of heartbreak.
Give your users the choice:
Show them that you’re not rigid, but also limit the number of choices in their palette, so that they can make mindful and informed decisions.
Crystal clear defaults:
The default minimum selected plan is highlighted clearly. And even if the extra plans are not selected, we still show the prices for the user to get a fair idea.
Comparable benefits:
Imagine if people walked around with their Tinder profile on their shirt? Too bad it doesn’t happen in real life. Our design is created in a tabular format, that users can glance at and quickly compare their choices.
Upsell:
In a healthy relationship, both parties should feel like they are winning. In our case, even though we’re proving a good deal on cancellation, we can also motivate them to opt for extra insurance. That way, we keep both the business and the customer happy.
Impact
By having a well laid out cancellation policy an increased response was seen in customers trusting us enough making a full payment.
Less time is spent by the customer support on dealing with cancellation of packages.
In a future post-COVID world, having clear-cut options for cancellation and protection, will be a key motivating factor for users to start trusting travel again.
Conclusion
A great relationship is built on honesty and trust. We hope with our efforts we were able to eliminate a lot of pain and heartbreak for customers while booking Holidays.
Despite the size and scale of disruption that the pandemic caused, We at make my trip are committed to providing the best solutions for both supplies and consumers.
