The next step…User Research
To understand more about our target users I did desk research on Customer Service
Agents and Gate agents to come up with their journey map
This included:
Reading blogs and articles
Watching several videos such as “A Day in the life of a Gate Agent/Customer Service
Agent” on youtube
Articles and Blogs
Wikipedia
Smallbusiness
Youtube Videos
Special List of Passengers
(It is flight Specific not Gate Specific)
It consists of :
• Customers who have special needs (Accesibility)
• Customers of unusual or different than average sizes(Too tall, overweight)
• Kids/minors flying without parent supervision
• Air Marshalls.
Draft 1
Careerplanner
Inputyouth
User Journey of a Customer Service Agent
User Interview Questionnaire
To come up with the final questionnaire, I came up with as many relevant
questions as possible around each journey point along with the time it
would take to answer each question
Draft 2
Final Questionnaire and Insights
Total number of Gate Agents interviewed - 3
Goals of the app
• To be able to track and assist customers that belong to the Disabled, Standby, Special list, and Late categories.
• To reduce the turnaround time of the aircraft by making sure they are on time
Working Areas
CSAs sit at a desk which is responsible for 1 or more
Gates and is usually between one or more gates
They can sit at:
• Boarding Gate
• Ticket Counter
• Baggage Claim
• Roamers - Walk around the airport and find
passenger to be celebrated
OTIS Software
It’s software that CSAs log in to every day when they enter their workspace. It lets the CSA know which gate they are assigned to for the day
It has a checklist for the CSA Agent’s daily tasks to assist them.
It has a record of all checked-in customers
*So it turns out that the Surprise and Delight app is Gate Specific, and not Agent-specific. However Roamers(CSAs that walk around the airport) find passengers to celebrate who are near and around their boarding gate.
Skywest
Daily Tasks
• Solve customer reservation problems i.e Delays, Cancellations
• Assist and help Disabled passengers with wheelchairs, strollers
etc…
• To board families together and disabled passengers first
• Upgrading of Customer’s boarding position
• Making boarding announcements
(Most difficult task because they have to juggle through a lot
of data in a short span of time because flights from different
gates would be taking off simultaneously)
• They use the OTIS System to know the boarding
announcement info such as Departure time, Late customers
• They call customers who don’t show up for a flight
• They are responsible for the standby customers
Standby Customer - A passenger who has checked in
and is at the airport and has not boarded on time
causing delays for the plane
CSAs work for fixed-hour shifts, i.e. they can leave for home in the middle of a flight boarding if their daily work hours are over, but Ops (Gate Agents) have to stay back and finish boarding the flight
Currently, the Gate Agents do not approach customers regarding assistance such as upgrading tickets, helping disabled passengers with onboarding, or assist a passenger travelling with a pet. The customers have to approach them for these services.
Surprise and Delight Use Case
Surprise and Delight is used only by CSAs (not by Ops) while passengers are waiting for a flight. The CSAs play games with them and hand them rewards from the app. For e.g. the CSA asks passengers might ask “Who has the prettiest bag?” or “Who is the most good-looking passenger male/female?” or “Which customer is best dressed?” and the customer wins an in app reward.
