Mapping a service that reduced vehicle breakdown downtime from 14 days to 48 hours. 

My role:

Service & product designer

Designing for:

Drivers / Car dealerships / Vehicle roadside assistance

Deliverables:

Service design blueprints - current and future service / User journey map / Ecosystem map / Research repository / Notifications framework

The result

Service blueprint ensuring minimal downtime

A service blueprint that took downtime from 14 days to 48 hours.

Valuable insights into drivers' behaviours

We uncovered one of many reasons for battery failures had to do with driver's habits in the vehicle

Briefs for other internal teams 

Surfacing opportunities for internal teams to reduce customer downtime

The problem

Batteries remain the number one single issue for Roadside Assistance call-outs for this blue chip organisation. These can cost the organisation £109 per call out. The issue is however multifaceted and can occur due to various reasons; from in-car equipment to the modem draining the battery. It also affected their brand’s image with their customers. 

We worked closely as a team of six. The team included a Product Owner, Delivery Manager, Technical Lead, Design Research Lead and a Product/Service Designer (me). The Research Lead and I worked closely together on a day to day basis to conduct research and refine insights. The Creative Prototyper and I examined how the service deliverables might take shape in future scenarios. The Product Owner, Delivery Manager and Technical Lead enabled us to understand the technical/engineering aspects and the organisation's ecosystem’s.

Leveraging the organisation's ecosystem

The project took place over five two-week sprints. The brief was to enhance the vehicle’s telematics systems in order to improve customer experience with regard to battery failures. This started with us reviewing existing in-vehicle and out of vehicle systems, along with data on battery failures, to understand how the organisation's ecosystem might work together to ensure an improved customer experience. 


We decided to focus on how to uncover signals regarding potential battery failures through in-vehicle algorithms developed within the organisation. These signals could guide customers on how to take the required actions.  


Creating the ecosystem map and mapping out the current service in a service design blueprint to surface opportunities both within the organisation and with interactions with customers.

Surfacing Opportunities

By the second sprint, our central question was more refined, and we were able to line up customers to discuss in the following sprints. Understanding customer’s behaviour and how they interact with these systems was vital to improve the experience.

The researcher and I facilitated ideation workshops with the whole team to refine our focus and to help us start storyboarding the future service on the back of our research. These were then presented to customers and stakeholders to test out.

The concept

An algorithm, created by the company, allowed us to recognise proactively when battery failures were about to occur. As a result of this and research a concept surfaced: ‘The dealer as the notification’.

By leveraging the car dealer’s network and mobile services we would be able to help with uptime by:

  • Getting the car dealership to inform drivers nearby about potential breakdowns, as they would be able to identify them through the in-vehicle algorithm. Customers can then come in and get their battery tested and replaced

  • Alternatively, they could send the mobile service to the driver to check and replace the battery

Testing the concept 

Due to GDPR pushbacks, arranging to talk to customers took longer than anticipated, and we were unable to meet our target. This resulted in our evidence being weak. Instead, we resorted to testing with the car dealers, those closest to the customers and enabling them to do the research. 

With the customers and the dealers we spoke to, we found out that: 

  1. Cheaper to have a breakdown vs be proactive 

  2. People are used to breakdowns but not to proactive services

  3. Dealers are not configured to deal with unplanned repairs 


The project did enable us to provide briefs for internal teams, these included:

  1. Warranty - A challenge for dealers. They end up paying for batteries to reduce customer downtime

  2. Data - The algorithm needed more refining

  3. Sales - Short journey and/or upfitting match for sole trader use cases

The learnings

Organise regular feedback from stakeholder

Reaching stakeholders within a short span of time and ensuring they were engaged and felt included was a challenge. However, we were able to get around this by arranging regular check-ins. 


Communicate that goals are shifting

The project was divided into sprints, this meant that we had to shift focus very quickly, while activities from the previous sprints would also spill over into the next.


Acknowledge when evidence is thin

Due to GDPR pushbacks, arranging to talk to customers took longer than anticipated, and we were unable to meet our target, which resulted in our evidence being weak.