Really?! now I need to deal with two unknown third-party providers, just to play badminton

If you are or work for a third-party provider, you might wish to step back and take a holistic view of the entire customer journey. My observations come from the purchasing process at BTFB and the registration process at GotCourts

Setting the scene

I used to play badminton regularly, at the TiB sports centre in Berlin, regularly booking a court online, showing up, and playing.

Then along came COVID-19, and I and all the other athletes of the world waited at home.

Then the lockdown was over and sports centres were reopened, at long last.

So, I tried to book a court at my usual sports centre, like I used to, only to discover that the sports centre had made a few changes:

#1 - payments needed to be made in advance in a pre-paid model at a new third-party provider, BTFB

#2 - booking a court could only be done online at another new third-party provider, GotCourts

The business intention is fairly obvious

In about 5 years of regularly playing badminton, I once phoned in sick and cancelled at the last minute.

That was known as a “no show”.

The court was booked, and therefore blocked for others, but the sports centre received no money.

Kinda shitty, but these things do happen.

However, I only did that once, but the sports centre had that problem frequently.

I know that b/c when booking a court myself, I could see that many courts were booked and blocked for me, yet on the day, I was (actually we, since badminton requires two) often the only person playing.

Obviously the business was looking for more commitment from its customers… if you book, then you show up, pay, and then play.

Completely understandable.

So a pre-paid system seemed like a good idea, and I can’t disagree.

Customers’ needs hadn’t changed; I would like to book a court, show up, and play.

Stocking up on credit with a third party provider

Of course the sports centre (TiB) provided a link to the new third-party provider, and I visited BTFB to stock up on some credit.

Hmmm, who were these BTFB people?

I was uncertain whether I was even on the proper site, as there was nothing related to the TiB sports centre (jargon: poor recognition and lack of orientation resulting in mild irritation). But I’m a power user and was stumped for only a brief moment…

I decided to scroll down the page and found, way below the fold, the logo of the sports centre.

Meanwhile and additionally, the hero image at the top had changed to the same image that was on the sports centre page, i.e. something recognisable.

That helped somewhat, but my first response was uncertainty… never a good thing.

The next thing on the page was a full width ad, directly linked to the other third-party provider, which took me away from the site where I needed to stock up on credit.

Again hmmm, what’s going on?

The user flow up to this point was a bit clunky, and becoming noticeably annoying (on a scale of 1-10, this was a 2).

I changed back to the BTFB site, still trying to pay for some credit.

Really! I just wanted to start playing badminton again.

A checkout can’t be difficult, right?

I selected one of the three available “payment plans” and hit the button “add to cart”.

Followed immediately with a click on “go to checkout”.

In the checkout I was given four possible ways forward, all equally weighted:

#1 - “I have an account”

#2 - “I’ve forgotten my password”

#3 - “I don’t yet have an account”

#4 - “I’d like to checkout as a guest”

The fact that #2 looked like at the rest, was simply poor design (jargon: lack of clarity).

I chose the 4th option.

The “checking out as a guest” option opened a form identical to the registration form, only the password field was missing (jargon: requiring inappropriate or irrelevant information).

All fields were mandatory, asking for name, address, country, eMail etc.

Hmmm, my irritation was growing, yet I reluctantly submitted details that I did not wish to provide.

We all know today, that personal data is worth more than gold.

At this point, the process was unnecessarily annoying (on a scale of 1-10, this was already a 5).

So I assumed that this was a classic example of collecting superfluous and highly valuable data, obviously, to sell on to dubious business associates (jargon: lack of trust).

In this context, and with these other options, we all know that checking out as a guest should mean no personal data.

What about the money?

It still wasn’t clear how this would pan out.

I was beginning to doubt whether I could start playing badminton again.

However, the next page offered the possibility to choose a shipping option, and I decided on the free option “by eMail”.

After that, the next page offered payments choices, and I chose to pay the money into their account, using the provided IBAN number.

So, I opened my online banking and transferred the money to the given account.

I returned to BTFB and clicked on “Next”.

The next page was a “success” page, saying an eMail had been sent.

So I waited for the eMail.

And waited.

And waited some more.

The aforementioned confirmation eMail arrived 34 mins. later.

Interestingly, the eMail stated at the top of the page that I should transfer the money into an account, and provided the same IBAN number.

At this point, the process had taken almost an hour of my time and was extremely annoying (on a scale of 1-10, this was an 8).

It remained unclear, however, how my pre-paid credit would be attributed to my account with the other third-party provider where the court would be booked (jargon: uncertainty leading to increased irritation).

Good design, when it’s done well, becomes invisible. It’s only when it’s done poorly that we notice it. - Jared Spool

I think I’d like to book a court now

Now that my pre-paid credit was on its way, or so I thought, it was time to flip over to GotCourts and book a court.

Playing badminton was turning out to be really hard work (jargon: cognitive overload).

I registered a new account with GotCourts.

I was allowed to access the site, but couldn’t actually do anything b/c my eMail needed to be confirmed.

So I waited for the confirmation eMail with the link, to confirm.

And waited.

And waited some more.

After more than 30 mins. of waiting, I decided to click on “send it again” b/c I hadn’t received an eMail.

Eventually I received an eMail, 15 mins. after the click on “send it again”.

I duly clicked on the link and was told that “I need to confirm my eMail”.

Hmmm, that’s weird!

So I clicked on “send it again” again.

This waiting and clicking and rejection went on for about 7 hours before I managed to click on a link that was able to confirm my eMail.

Finally I was in and confirmed, but I had no credit to book anything.

At this point, the process had gone off the annoying scale (on a scale of 1-10, this is a 25, maybe even higher).

More waiting, without actually knowing how the process could or would work… no description, no explanation, no advice, nothing.

Hmmm, I wasn’t sure whether I had thrown my money away or not. I was indeed seriously doubting the entire process.

Somehow, magically, two days after my bank transfer, I received an eMail from GotCourts telling me that my credit was available on my account, and that I could now book a court.

Now I get to book a court

So I gleefully logged into my new account at GotCourts, searched for my old sports centre, and faced a page that I couldn't, at first, decipher... which courts were booked and which were available. Like booking a seat on an aeroplane or any other service, there are conventions, and conventional wisdom, when it comes to showing availability, and apparently GotCourts are unaware of this.

So I "clicked" on a court, only to find out that it was booked. That, in turn, help me decipher their colour coding.

Where did it go wrong?

Did you, as a reader, spot all the places where things went wrong?

Or did you, as a reader & so-called power user, think the system works fine and that I, the customer, made all the mistakes?

The way I see it, all three parties contributed to a convoluted mess.

The sports centre passed the buck, relying too strongly on the two other third parties.

Both of the third-party providers didn’t tailor their service sufficiently.

The third-party “pre-paid credit” did create a dedicated page for the sports centre, but otherwise, their tailoring was poorly done.

I had trouble booking the desired article (the pre-paid credit).

I was asked far too many questions which were completely unnecessary for the transaction.

And I saw a lot of redundant information, all of which was repeated in their confirmation eMail.

The third-party “book a court” had only their own website, with no dedicated page.

Their eMail validation system went AWOL and refused to acknowledge me. Almost ad infinitum.

And after confirming my eMail, I was left hanging, on my own, with zero information.

There are a great deal of easy-to-fix problems in this customer journey, so-called low hanging fruit, which I’ve described below.

Low hanging fruit for TiB (the sports centre)

Low hanging fruit for TiB which could easily improve their UX:

1./ text descriptions should reflect the actual process, as opposed to wishful thinking (e.g. they mention “saving a favourite”, but there is no functionality for favourites on the third-party website)

2./ their website copy should say that users need to register with the same eMail address at all third parties, to ease the allocation of pre-paid credit

3./ their website copy should say “first register at GotCourts using the same eMail, then go to BTFB and, using the same eMail, book credit”

Low hanging fruit for BTFB (pre-paid credit)

BTFB could improve their UX enormously, as follow:

1./ re-location of information to bring the sports centre image and logo into view increases recognition and trust, and suggests that BTFB works hand in hand with the sports centre

2./ proper weighting of information would smooth out their process

3./ they could say up front, that an account at “GotCourts” will be required

4./ their shipping page can have ONLY one option, namely “send to your GotCourts eMail”

5./ they should drop the idea of user accounts entirely, not even a guest checkout b/c they don’t have a checkout process (a checkout process is one in which money is transferred, i.e. PayPal, stripe, credit card etc.) and any account is, therefore, redundant

6./ the page offering payment choices must be removed as it’s redundant (it’s a repeat of the message in the confirmation eMail) and delays the closure of the process

7./ they should adopt a low-tech solution, and say “thanks, we’ve sent you an eMail with all the instructions”

8./ the confirmation eMail should go describe the next steps, and state a unique identifier at the top of the page, e.g. the used eMail or an invoice nr. or something else, to allow the pre-paid credit to be allocated to the correct “GotCourts eMail” account

Low hanging fruit for GotCourts (court booking)

Low hanging fruit for GotCourts could improve their UX enormously, as follow:

1./ they should create a dedicated landing page for the sports centre (the same thing that BTFB does – see 1./ low hanging fruit for BTFB above)

2./ they should recommend using the sports centre eMail, if an account already exists

3. / they should speed up their confirmation eMail, and send it within seconds

4./ they should allow users (like me) to save a few favourite sports centres (although I personally only need one)

5./ they should use a more conventional colour scheme to differentiate between available and booked (two different greens is not the clearest colour scheme)

Why should these changes be made?

First and foremost, design solves a problem.

When done properly, it makes things simple and easy to use for everyone.

Its aim is neither to give users too little or too much information, but rather to give users just enough information to take the next step. All the unnecessary, technical, backend stuff should stay out of the way.

Trust me, no one actively looks for more but redundant information. And why should they?!

Secondly, and rather alarmingly, the truth is that only 5% - 8% of the adult population are computer savvy.

Yes! that’s 8% at the most who are able to complete tasks on a computer - read the still valid report from the NN Group, dated end of 2016.

In my experience, power users (let’s be honest, if you’re reading this, then that’s you) make up at the very most 10% of that 8%… if we do the maths, that’s 0.8% of the adult population at the most!

Thirdly, although the business intention is completely understandable, the improvement for the sports centre has been achieved at the cost of all customers, who now bear the burden.

Their process has been hacked into two separate, vaguely related, individual processes.

Yes! They can still book a court, show up, and play.

But they need to jump between two independent services, increasing their load.

One last thing…

I’m genuinely surprised that the third-party “pre-paid credit” provider wasn’t able to integrate its service into the existing online booking service at the sports centre.

Which would have been one hoop less for customers to jump through.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got nothing against GotCourts (and third-party services in general), but in this case, the sports centre’s existing online booking service has been replaced with a third party online booking service.

Finally... thanks for the read!

If you would like me to look at your website or app, just shoot me an email at beck (at) beck-button (dot) de or go to the contact page on my website or, if you prefer, connect via Linked-In.