WaitWaddle

What is the problem your solution addresses?

According to a survey conducted by TELUS International, nearly 62% of customers would rather sit in a traffic jam than talk with customer service. Every year, millions are trapped in an experience that hasn't changed since the 1960s - the hold queue of customer service. Upon entering this queue, hold music, vague wait time estimates, and no clarity as to whether the correct department was even contacted plagues the customer support experience of patrons. A system that was originally designed for in-person interaction does not evenly translate to today’s high prevalence of virtual customer support. The consequences are significant. Customers, especially Gen Z with an average attention span of just 8 seconds, hang up frustrated, leave issues unresolved, and lose trust in the companies they're trying to reach. Our design prototype addresses this problem by turning this time-consuming and painful experience with virtual customer support into something more productive and engaging.

Why did you pick this solution, and how does it address the problem?

To address this problem of wasted time, we asked: what if we redesigned the experience around the wait itself? Our prototype, WaitWaddle, addresses the problem on three levels:

1. Transparency removes uncertainty. By providing customers with real-time queue position and accurate wait estimates, people have a better idea of how long the wait will be.
2. Voice AI agent triage eliminates wasted time in department routing. A big source of customer dissatisfaction is waiting in the wrong queue. However, our voice AI agent mitigates this problem by routing customers to the correct department upfront.
3. A game overrides boredom. Inspired by the Chrome dino game, our penguin runner, Waddle, gives customers something to actually do. Discount rewards from playing the game while waiting rewards customers for their patience. We picked this solution because it supports customers without requiring companies to overhaul their entire support infrastructure.

Built With

• figma