New mobile app that increased couriers productivity by 20%, saving 1h of work time

Overview

The new mobile platform for delivery company helped in improving operational processes and transfering activities to the new devices. It started with an intense business analysis to define the product direction that resulted in an MVP addressing and simplifing crucial journeys of core employees and created space to introduing next features planned on the roadmap.

My Contribution

• Leading the team of analysts
• UX research Mentoring of client PMs
• Design of the whole app
• Collaboration with devs

My Role

• Couriers saved 1 hour of daily work time
• 20% improvement in volume parcels processed
• 10% time saved on planning routes

Platforms

Android

Year

2020

Problem

Urgent Cargus faced the end of support for their couriers' PDAs. This gave them an opportunity to refine their processes and create new solution that could help delivery teams work better. To get this right, I organised a workshop on which we sythesized 3 key problems linked to the current solution.

1. New generation

Any new courier joining the company couldn’t use the app without reading a long and dull pdf guide.

2. Obslete App

Couriers complained for years about the PDA's app usability for pick-ups and deliveries.

3. Inconsistent user flows

User flows were inconsistent, forcing users to go back and forth between screens in order to complete activities.

How might we make deliveries and pick-ups fast, simple, and clear for couriers?

Goals

We converted our Outcome Statement into opportunities and possible solutions

Waypoints, not parcels

Couriers had to read addresses from each parcel to plan their daily routes. This step held people from starting their meaningful part of the job. The solution had to help couriers in faster route planning, best if automated.

Device as a Parcel Assistant

App didn't show enough information to plan pickups and deliveries. Information about the number of parcels to take was shown only when scanning a printed AWB. New solution had to inform about this before reaching the target waypoint.

Design: Simple and shared

Design and development time were uncomfortably short. The time was short to design app when the company process were redefined. This meant we decided to base on simple components that focuses on functionality and scalability. Next step on the roadmap was a whole company rebranding that would also impact internal products.

Analysis: building a custom app or integrating COTS?

Understanding "what we have", "what we want", and "what we miss right now" was a crucial part of investigating if the new solution should be bought and integrated, or built from scratch. Analysis was also done with company SMEs that shared key details (that were not known by key decision-makers before).

Waypoints with parcels

Design of the new solution had to be easy to understand and to build. The initial distinction between Deliveries and Pick-ups, and making posssible to reorder waypoints helped couriers in starting their routes much sooner.

AWB scanning without guessing

What you see is what you scan. No guessing games when looking only for AWB number. The app could show details that help couriers double confirm if the parcel they scanned are for the exact waypoint.

Further exploration

Next steps were planned to enrich the UI by introducing more visual elements guiding users atention. As this wasn't the part we could deliver sooner due to technological limits, we still have started to keep the conversation with product stakeholders.

Results

My involvement in the project had to end 2 months before the estimated end of development. Couriers started working with the new platform 1 month before Black Friday. This time let us do further improvements after getting feedback from couriers and their supervisors.

Key Improvements

1 hour

+20%

+10%

Time saved by couriers every day

The volume of parcels possible to deliver at the same time

Time saved on planning routes

Press

Cargus continues to digitalize its operations, following an investment of EUR 2.25 million

Last year, for example, the volume went up 20% and the pace is the same this year. Equipping our couriers with Personal Digital Assistant devices responds to these needs, by simplifying processes to the benefit of couriers and clients alike. (…)

(…) the delivery process will be significantly simplified, couriers performing all operations in a single point of contact: from calling and texting the client to mapping routes and signing off digitally. This simplification will be reflected in couriers’ productivity, which is set to go up 10% on each route, but also in the time spent by them on deliveries, as they would save approximately one hour per day, according to the company’s estimates.

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