Dover Fueling Solutions
How we designed a solution thanks to field studies combined with an interactive prototype tested in situ
Dover Fueling Solutions (formerly Tokheim) wanted to redesign its touch-enabled payment terminal. The challenge was to find the right balance between the habits of the broad customer base and the needs of an evolving product.
| Client | Sector | LAnguage | Team |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dover Fueling Solutions | Private | English | 2 designers |
Designing the refuelling digital experience
Every time you refuel your car in an automatic petrol station you use a digital terminal: a device in our everyday life that we don’t pay attention to anymore. We have redesigned it for Tokheim. Indeed, over its lifetime, so much functionality had been incrementally added to the product that it had become complex to maintain and to extend. The product’s user interface not only had to be made visually more appealing, it also needed to adapt to a potentially wider product offering and new payment methods.
From understanding the flow to prototyping the solution in the field
We started with a field study during which we talked to users and station managers to get a feel for the current situation. From that, we understood that our main challenge would be to redesign the experience’s flow. In this way, the flow diagram containing all possible hardware configurations, payment methods and product offerings was redesigned to be more efficient for the user and easier to maintain for Tokheim. We paid particular attention to error handling and user guidance in the case of mishaps, as well as to the existing task flow, which users performed in a semi-unconscious manner.
The new visual design included intuitive and clear icons. Moreover, both the detailed design and the visual design were tested twice in a live context. We showed our low fidelity hardware prototype incorporating a touchscreen to different consumers asking them for feedback. It allowed us to test realistic situations, paying close attention to the link with other input/output devices.
An adaptative terminal for each situation
The thorough approach Tokheim asked us to take was in the same line as ours, we could think carefully about each opportunity that came to our mind. Moreover, the guerrilla user test we set up directly in the field provided insights to enhance the solution and then fit better with our users’ needs.
The newly designed terminal enables higher customer throughput thanks to an efficient task flow and clear user guidance. Moreover, the product has become easier both to configure and to extend, thus adapting to future product offerings and payment solutions.
With the new design, Tokheim offered to each of its clients the product most suited to their particular commercial strategy.
“We are very enthusiastic about the new design of our Crypto VGA. We received many positive reactions and noticed an increase in the sales of our outdoor payment terminal.”
Peter Van Nauw, Sr. Director Systems & Payment EMEA
Continued work for the configuration tool
Dover Fuelling Solutions caters for many different types of fuelling stations. The product comes with a tool allowing for the petrol station manager, cashier or service engineer to configure the system to match their specific needs. Along the same lines, this tool had become outdated. Caring also for their users behind the scenes, DFS asked Namahn to redesign this user interface and to transform it into a state of the art, web-based tool. We took the same approach, collaborating with the sales, customer support, product manager, the software engineers and the end-users to create a new tool, fit for purpose and with room for future adaptations (mobile, remote and touch based).