Step 1: Defining the problem

As a lvl 1 care agent I dealt with customer care calls about usability issues whether they are technical or due to user error. There isnt much we can do to reduce the number of technical issues besides report them but one does notice where small, strategic changes to a user’s experience will have a sizeable impact on reducing call volume and thus reducing the cost of customer care.

Here is what our password reset looked like:

Users would enter their password once and hit next without noticing the second field:

This error would pop up alerting them that they needed to retype the new password in the retype password field circle above:

The customers would retype the password:

And click next:

This would lead them to the same message they’ve already received but haven’t understood.

Step 2: Investigation

Scope of issue: An informal poll of care agents asking informed me that they received  2 – 15  calls a week a week with an average response of 5.7 calls a week regarding this issue.

Spread across our team (around 75 – 85 agents) this would equal 427.5 calls per week(75 x 5.7) . If we took the more modest numbers 75 agents and 2 calls per week we reach an average of 150 calls a week due to this misunderstanding.

The user’s perspective: Part of our troubleshooting involves connecting directly into the user’s machine and watching them go through their issue via GoToAssist (a remote support tool we offer). The idea is that we could just remote in and fix it but if we see what is happening we have a chance to educate the user in best practices.

After watching our users repeatedly fail at this task I began to ask probing questions.

Mainly “what would have made it obvious to you where you had to retype the password?”

Step 3: Solution

With the insights I gathered I went about mocking up a solution:

I showed it to a few colleagues and customers before presenting it to a manager.

They were able to get the solution to our product team who implemented the fix.

You can see the solution anytime you’d like to reset your password for GoToMeeting, GoToWebinar, GoToTraining or Openvoice.