Auto Repair Service

ABOUT YOURMECHANIC

YourMechanic is a startup company that providers auto repair and maintenance services delivered to a customer’s location of choice, such as their home or workplace. Mechanic request and initial diagnosis are done via a web application, and the mechanic visits the customer’s location to identify and address repair issues.

Through my work with YourMechanic, I was involved in the UX design and research for multiple customer and mechanic-facing touchpoints.

PROBLEM STATEMENT

“The company’s goal was to create a mobile app for customers, to manage bookings in a simple manner, and to better leverage customer data. My role was to figure out effective information architecture and early-stage UX for the application.”

USAGE SCENARIO

Primary focus of app is to manage bookings once confirmed, and customer-mechanic communication. Additional goals include:

Creating new bookings
Recommending services & advance bookings
Diagnosing vehicle issues
Scheduling maintenance
Referral & loyalty program

On average, one account would involve 2-3 transactions to be managed at any point in time.

PROTOTYPING

Based on the target scenario of usage and hypotheses about customers, I created wireframes and working prototypes to represent two possible directions for the information architecture of the mobile application. The initial wireframes were created using Sketch and prototypes were created using Figma.

USABILITY TESTING & INTERVIEWS

Following creating the two prototypes, I planned and conducted a usability testing and interview study. For the study, I recruited 4 participants (including one pilot participant). The participants were recruited using variation-based sampling based on their frequency of experiences with YourMechanic, gender, and the number of vehicles they owned. Sessions were approximately 60 minutes long each and conducted over Zoom. The goal of the study was to understand the following:

RQ1: What type of information architecture aligns best with users’ mental models?
RQ2: How much redundancy is optimal for users?
RQ3: How effective are the text descriptors of top-level categories at communicating purpose and usage?

The study activities took place in three phases.

Introduction & Pre-Interview

Purpose of study described
Background about company shared
Recording consent obtained
Interview about planning for auto-repair services

Usability Testing Activity

Prototypes shared and technological issues (if present) addressed
Participants asked to go through 9 different scenarios using both prototypes while thinking aloud. Order of prototypes varied across participants
Notes for each task taken using data collection sheet

Post-Test REFLECTIVE Interview

Interview reflecting on overall experience using prototypes
Questions included asking about specific interactions/sections and clarity of text

Data Collection and Test Scenarios

**Data collection sheet for usability testing scenarios**

Participants went through 9 different scenarios during the usability testing activity. These were across the following categories:

Managing bookings for eg. checking mechanic arrival status, or updating address before appointment
Getting in touch with customer service or mechanics
Looking for recommendations
Booking new services

Through the activity, participants were encouraged to think aloud. Success of activity, path used and other notes were made by me while observing the participants.

USABILITY FINDINGS

High Preference for Vehicle-Centric View

RQ1: What type of information architecture aligns best with users’ mental models?

Varied Pathways Utilized and Re-Utilized for Tasks

RQ2: How much redundancy is optimal for users?

Participants utilized different paths than other participants for some tasks. Three of four participants repeatedly used the same path they did during initial scenarios across other similar scenarios.

For example, for reaching out to a mechanic in different scenarios, one user repeatedly used the conversations page as a pathway, whereas another repeatedly used the service pages.

Design Insight: Maintaining some redundancy in pathways for customers to do key tasks, and introducing learning features during onboarding and usage.
Research Insight: Testing pathways for task completion with a larger sample of participants.

Text Descriptions

RQ3: How effective are text descriptors of top-level categories at communicating purpose and usage?

Participants were able to clearly understand the purpose and anticipated content behind all the top-level menu categories and buttons. An exception was the ‘Advisor’ page: participants expected this to be a page to receive reliable advice from mechanics. Some participants indicated more of an interest in speaking this than in reading articles.

Some confusion was observed regarding the different types of quotes and their names: recommended services, saved quotes, and mechanic recommended quotes.

UX Writing Insight: Developing a simpler system to denote services and quotes across YourMechanic touchpoints.
Design/Research Insight: Exploring combining ‘Advisor’ and ‘Conversations’ pages to be main mechanic-centric page and deprioritizing articles.

Unclear Floating Action Button & Horizontal Scrolling Menu

For one participant, the interaction of the floating action buttons and horizontal scrolling menu was not clear. The participant took additional time or got stuck during tasks that involved interacting with these features.

Design Insight: Exploring alternative menu styles in place of horizontal scrolling, or adding additional signifiers to horizontal scrolling interactions; Including learning support for these features through onboarding.

ADDITIONAL FINDINGS

Importance of Trusting Relationship with Mechanic

Participants indicated needing to know how trustworthy the mechanic is and why any services are recommended. One participant said they would search for a mechanic with specific expertise in the make of vehicle if they had, say, a BMW.

““[I want the mechanic to] explain with knowledge how it’s affecting my car in the near future.””

Design Insight: Equipping mechanics with information and nudges to explain specific problems; Providing in-app details for why a recommended service is needed.

Varied Levels of Hands-on Engagement

Two participants suggested polar-opposite levels of hands-on engagement they would have in any auto repair circumstance for which they seek YourMechanic’s services. This indicates potentially different needs and opportunities across different user personas.

““I could message mechanics about any insight I may have into the problem already””

““I wouldn’t create a quote myself from scratch; [I] don’t know what really needs to be done””

Research Insight: Conducting or reviewing customer personas to inform how planning for auto services could be done by varied customers.

Connection to the People Behind the Service

A common theme across users’ actions during the usability test, and their comments and responses, was the connection customers might seek to the mechanics and people behind the service. For example, two participants said that in case of updating their appointment (one of the test scenarios), they would message mechanics in addition to updating information in the app. One participant commented about liking that customer service can be called from anywhere in the app.

““Service Bay sounds very corporate.. Garage sounds like I’m speaking to people””

UX Writing Insight: Adjusting descriptions to sound less formal and to emphasize people.
Design Insight: Exploring more functionality in the mechanic-based views, such as the ability to book a mechanic directly.