Customer-centric digital UX design for train operator c2c

Reducing queueing and demand on c2c staff

The key pain points c2c was keen to address were queueing at the ticket vending machines (TVM) and staff time being taken up helping travellers purchase or print tickets. The company wanted to improve this experience - across all digital touchpoints - to not only free up c2c staff to focus on providing a better overall customer service, but also create a better digital ticket purchasing experience for customers.

We began by encouraging travellers to purchase and use a Smartcard when purchasing tickets online or through the app. This helped reduce the need for travellers to queue at a ticket vending machine to pick up tickets before hopping on the train.

Then we turned our focus to improving the experience at the c2c ticket vending machines themselves, running user research to gain a view into what was working and what wasn't. We were able to identify several quick-win improvements that could be made to the ticket purchase UI and UX to speed up this journey flow.

This included making it easier to find and purchase the right ticket as well as aligning the information contained in confirmation emails and ticket printing prompts on ticket vending machines to reduce confusion. More recently, we added a feature to enable customers to purchase more than one journey in a single transaction, reducing the need for people to visit the ticket office.

Adapting to post-pandemic travel

Early in our relationship with c2c, the train operator had to adapt to changing commuter behaviour post pandemic. The organisation needed to find ways to support new travel habits and encourage more leisure travel. So, we turned the c2c website into a hub of information for all types of travellers.

Just a few highlights from this work include:

• Collaboration with c2c's marketing agency on new station information pages 

• A redesign of the Offers & Days Out section to inspire leisure travel 

• Made it easier to purchase tickets via the website

• Designed a service alterations page focused on immediate upcoming alterations to train services

• Built a new Ticket Types information page to help people identify the best ticket for their travel needs

This year, a key area of focus has been on how information about disruptions is displayed on the website with the goal to create a more holistic joined-up view of everything impacting a journey, enabling travellers to re-route themselves so they can still get to their destination.

Adapting to changing technology

In 2023, c2c rolled out etickets, another move to help reduce the need for people to queue at ticket vending machines and provide more flexible ticket options to travellers. To support its adoption, we worked with c2c to improve the purchase flow for etickets via the c2c app. Other app improvements have included the ability to more easily request refunds, and access travel and disruption information via the app.

As c2c rolls out these new initiatives the website remains a key channel for c2c to communicate with travellers and ensure they have the most up-to-date information about travel and ticket options.

To best achieve these aims, we recently completed a full redesign of the c2c website alongside a review of the information architecture (IA). This has improved the navigation and booking journey flow and aligned the website design with refreshed c2c branding. We have also built a new design library to make it easier for c2c to manage the website and retain brand consistency across all of its digital channels.