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MySSE native app: presenting tariff details

SSE Energy Services, part of the OVO family

Overview

Brand - SSE Energy Services

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SSE Energy Services was a brand under the OVO group, serving over 3.5 million customers. SSE was one of the UK's largest energy providers. SSE/OVO prioritised exceptional customer service across all its brands, demonstrated by their 2021 Uswitch Best Customer Service award. Each brand leveraged multidisciplinary teams to develop digital products that empowered customers to manage their energy effectively.​

 

I worked for OVO LTD from 2021 - 2022. 

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Role - UX Designer 

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Problem 

The Product Owner for SSE's mobile app, prompted by low conversion rates in the customer retention journey, identified the need to display tariff details on the MySSE app. The retention journey was being used by members to view their energy tariffs, leading to drop-offs. Additionally, the contact centre experienced a significant increase in tariff-related inquiries during Q1 2021.

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SSE's mobile product team prioritised maintaining an exceptional customer experience on its app, which had earned a 4.5-star rating on both Google Play and Apple App stores at the time of writing. 
 

My team and role
I was the UX Designer within a multidisciplinary product team consisting of:

 

  • A UX Design Lead

  • Product Owner

  • Content Designer (UX Writer) 

  • Insights (Data Analytics) 

  • Testers

  • and Developers.

 

This problem was identified using Analytics and the Hypothesis was set by the Product Owner and Data Analytics (Insights) colleagues before I joined.

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​Results 

  • 8% uplift on Retention conversion (via mobile).

  • 1k+ views daily on the feature. 

  • Less load on SSE/OVO contact centre. 

Screenshot 2022-01-07 at 11.00.10.png

The 'user' needs

Members should be able to seamlessly renew or view their tariff within the MySSE app, eliminating friction and minimising the need for contact centre interactions.

 

Making these essential actions difficult forces members to expend additional effort, potentially resulting in frustration and increased contact centre enquiries.

The business need

Prior to this project, the team made a content change to the app's retention link to address what they perceived as a misleading label.

 

However, this change resulted in increased traffic to the tariff change section of the website, with only a small proportion of users actually proceeding with a tariff change. This quick fix proved ineffective in addressing the issue of high contact centre volumes related to tariff inquiries.​

Hypothesis

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We believed that by displaying tariff information in the app 

for all app customers will achieve an increase in retention conversion. We'll know this is true when we see an improvement in the conversion rate on the retention journey from mobile.

Develop: Competitor analysis

I began the design process by analysing tariff presentations from various brands, including those outside the energy sector. This revealed three common patterns for displaying tariffs on account spaces:

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  1. Direct placement below the account balance on the dashboard

  2. Inclusion in a menu or hamburger menu

  3. Dedicated product (tariff) pages

 

View the findings board as a PDF. 
 

Considering Jakob's Law and the likelihood of customers switching utility providers, I opted for placing tariff details directly below the account balance on the MySSE app. This decision was made because I thought this had the best 'information scent' and 'findability'.

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Given the absence of dedicated researchers on this project, this research phase served as a rapid and effective means of understanding user needs.

Screenshot of the competitor analysis on Miro.

Develop: Sketching 

I collaboratively brainstormed with my UX Design Lead to refine the feature design, exploring four variations:
 

  1. Side-by-side tariffs on one card

  2. Stacked tariff details on one card

  3. Stacked tariff details with a calendar reminder CTA

  4. Stacked tariff details with a push notification CTA

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The agreed-upon solution was stacked tariff details with a 'view tariff details' button accessible from the account balance menu. This aligned with the app's design approach and provided quick access to detailed tariff information. Option 4 was later explored and presented to colleagues, as it held potential to facilitate future tariff changes for members.

Sketches pasted on to a Figjam board. 

Deliver: high fidelity wireframe

I wireframed 5 options for colleagues to review in our design critique that was scheduled. 

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  1. Card with a switch to turn on push notifications to remind customers to pick a new tariff when their contract ends. 

  2. Card with a message that is bolted on when a customer is near to the end of their contract. There were three variations of this. 

  3. A card with the tariff details. 

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I also prototyped a page with detailed tariff information. 

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Doing this allows my team members to have options to pick from and discuss what works best in the design critique. 

High fidelity wireframes of the tariff feature and tariffs details page. 

Deliver: Design critique

Following the wireframing stage, the design team convened for a design critique session.

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The team agreed with the conceptual design, suggesting that the card display only the tariff name and end dates, emphasizing the most crucial information for members.

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Regarding the notification switch and tariff change messaging, colleagues advised deferring these elements to a later phase.

 

Instead, a push notification reminding members to renew their tariff would be implemented.

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The finalized design retained the stacked tariff details card but with reduced content, ensuring a clear and concise presentation.

The card the team chose to use. 

Graphs showing: 

-Increase in conversion as session decrease