usability inspection report on

INFO- 1543 Usability and Evaluative Methods School of Informatics

IUPUI FALL 2012

MICHAEL E. WILSON

USABILITY INSPECTION REPORT OneTravel.com

Inspected by: Aeshvarya Verma

Chin Powit Rungsangthiwakorn Hsiao Wen

Reecha Bharali

Contents Executive Summary ..................................................................................................................... 4

Overview of the Application ........................................................................................................ 5

Sitemap ..................................................................................................................................... 6

Inspection Methods Used ............................................................................................................ 7

Scenario Based Inspection ................................................................................................... 7

Heuristic Inspection ............................................................................................................. 7

Severity Rating ......................................................................................................................... 8

Inspection Result ......................................................................................................................... 9

Grouping ................................................................................................................................... 9

General Issues ........................................................................................................................ 11

1. Inconsistency in graphical elements in different locations of the website. ................... 11

2. Unclear graphical distinction between clickable and not clickable elements ................ 12

3. Word that might not convey the object clearly. ............................................................. 14

Vacation Front Page ............................................................................................................... 15

Missing Functionality and Technical Problems ................................................................. 15

Finding 1: Booking Restrictions: No Flexible Date Option ............................................................. 15 Finding 2: Booking Restrictions: Do not allow to book vacation which is more than 30 days apart ............................................................................................................................................................ 15 Finding 3: Identical Top Navigation and Search Box ......................................................................... 16 Finding 4: No autocomplete for Airline selection ............................................................................... 17 Finding 5: No Indicator where the error occurs .................................................................................. 17

Graphic / Semiotic .............................................................................................................. 18

Finding 6: No Clear differences in different mode of booking ......................................................... 18 Content ............................................................................................................................... 19

Finding 7: Booking Restriction: Do not give information on how user could recover. ................ 19 Finding 8: No Indicator where the error occurs .................................................................................. 19

Loading Page .......................................................................................................................... 21

Graphics / Semiotic ............................................................................................................ 21

Finding 9: Loading Page Progress is not visible. ................................................................................ 21 Finding 10: The important search information is not visible ........................................................... 22

Navigation ........................................................................................................................... 22

Finding 11: There is no exit from the Loading page. ......................................................................... 22 Vacation Search Result .......................................................................................................... 23


Finding 12: Sort by requested time doesn't sort flight by requested time ..................................... 23 Finding 13: No Multiple Hotels map view ............................................................................................ 24 Finding 14: No option to change search (12) ........................................................................................ 24 Finding 15: Breadcrumb cannot be click .............................................................................................. 25 Finding 16: No Session Expiration Indication (25) ............................................................................. 25 Finding 17: Start New Search takes user to a different page. ........................................................... 26

Graphic / Semiotic .............................................................................................................. 27

Finding 18: Important buttons and links are not design to be prominent (33) .............................. 27 Navigation ........................................................................................................................... 28

Finding 19: Session timeout take user to a different search page, rather than where user came from, homepage. ....................................................................................................................................... 28 Finding 20: No Link to help from vacation page ................................................................................. 29

Information Architecture .................................................................................................... 29

Finding 21: Difficulty in comparing Flight Search Result in long list. ........................................... 29 Finding 22: Vacation Detail is put under Hotel Detail ...................................................................... 30

Operational / Transaction ................................................................................................... 31

Finding 23: Confusing 4 steps task separation .................................................................................... 31 Finding 24: No explanation why Checkout Button is disabled (28) ................................................. 32

Checkout Page ........................................................................................................................ 33


Finding 25: User cannot choose flight seat .......................................................................................... 33 Finding 26: No Facebook Login option ................................................................................................ 33

Graphics / Semiotics ........................................................................................................... 34

Finding 27: Seat preference settings and meal plan are important and should be visible. ......... 34 Synopsis ..................................................................................................................................... 35

Appendixes ................................................................................................................................. 36

Scenarios Created & Associated Tasks .................................................................................. 36

Cognitive Walkthrough Result ............................................................................................... 38

Executive Summary

OneTravel.com is a travel reservation website. The primary purpose of the website is to provide a single point reservation service to different travel booking, for example flight booking, hotel booking and car rental. Customers can reserved these service individually (Flight Booking, Hotel Booking and Car Booking) and they can also book all 3 of these services together (Vacation Booking). In Cognitive Walkthrough, 4 scenarios were created based on different functions in the website. These are booking cheap vacation booking, high preferences flight booking (time, airline, class, etc.), customer service and group booking. However due to the scope of the study for this class purpose, only vacation booking was inspected. This inspection revealed problems that user might have when completing different task within the site. In the Heuristic Evaluation, Nielsen’s 10 Heuristics, was employed in the inspection. This revealed possible problems, based on expert experience, judging on the visual design. Due the task-oriented nature of the website, the inspection result are combined. Similar problem types that exist across the website are are grouped in the global issues section. The detailed results are section into different screens (Vacation Front Page, Loading Page, Vacation Search Result Page and Checkout) for ease of understanding and separation for different development team. The issues are grouped into the following category:

• Missing Functionality and Technical Problems – should be considered when adding new features or improving the website features.

• Design Dimensions (Graphic / Semiotic, Navigation, Content, Information Architecture, Operation / Transaction) – should be consider when improving the visual design.

Overview of the Application OneTravel.com is a travel reservation website. The primary purpose of the website is to provide a single point reservation service to different travel booking, for example flight booking, hotel booking and car rental. Customers can reserved these service individually (Flight Booking, Hotel Booking and Car Booking) and they can also book all 3 of these services together (Vacation Booking). OneTravel.com is a travel website offering Flights, Hotels, and Packages to top destinations throughout the world. Onetravel.com was launched in Pennsylvania in the mid-nineties and has grown to be one of best recognized Online Travel brands in the US and Internationally. It is one of the oldest and most recognized travel sites, celebrated for incredibly low airfares, last minute flight deals, cheap business class flights and affordable first class fares, Discount Hotels the Best car Rental deals and attractive Vacation Packages all year round. They have added 84,000 negotiated hotel rates to our offering. Their products are being backed by 1-800 courteous and professional customer support any time of the day 24/7. OneTravel provides various specialty travels such as:

● Business/First Class Travel ● Gay & Lesbian Travel ● Student Travel ● Senior Travel ● Ethnic Destinations - India ● 84,000 Discount Hotel Rates ● Discounted Packages and Vacations to all worldwide destinations

The OneTravel.com website’s goal is to be a website which allow user to do multiple types of booking, flight, hotel, cars rental, from many different service providers, airlines, hotels, car rental company. The main function of this website is to provide one-stop service for user to easily find and make bookings.

Sitemap

Figure 1 Simplified site map of the OneTravel.com

Inspection Methods Used A usability evaluation was conducted on OneTravel.com. The two basic methods were used for the inspection: scenario based inspection and heuristic inspection.

Scenario Based Inspection

Based on the goals of the site and the variety of users the website can support; four basic scenarios for four different types of users were selected. The first scenario focused on how to book a cheap flight. The second scenario focused on how flight can be booked by a highly constraint customer, book at a specific time, seat selection, etc. The third scenario focused on how customer with less technological competency can seek help within the site. The forth and the last scenario focused on how to make a group booking. Due to the large scope of the inspection and the need to conduct the user testing in the second part of this class, only Vacation booking scenario are inspected. Vacation Booking Scenario

a. User: Bill, Graduate Student, 24 years old b. Biography: Bill is a master student at IUPUI. He is enrolled in the HCI program and is very skilled programmer. Right now he is Flat Broke but wants to go to L.A. Since the transportation in L.A. is really bad he would like to rent a car for the whole period of his stay. He also would like to book a hotel, however, he will be visited by his girl friend so he would like to stay in a 5-star hotel on that day. c. Goals: Find a cheapest round-trip flight from Indianapolis to Los Angeles in December considering the duration of stay as 4 days. Book a cheapest hotel for 3 days. Book another hotel (5 star) for 1 day. Rent a cheapest car for 4 days.

Heuristic Inspection

The 10 principles are listed below: 1. Visibility of system status 2. Match between system and the real world 3. User control and freedom 4. Consistency and standards 5. Error prevention 6. Recognition rather than recall

7. Flexibility and efficiency of use 8. Aesthetic and minimalist design 9. Help users recognize, diagnose and recover from errors 10. Help and documentation

Severity Rating Here a severity rating similar to the Neilson’s severity scale is used, however the focus is put on the consideration of the impact on the users. The following 1 to 4 rating scale can be used to rate the severity of usability problems: 1 = Cosmetic problem: need not be fixed unless extra time is available on project 2 = Minor impact: problem that might cause some impact to the user (fixing this should be given low priority) 3 = Major impact: problems that might cause high impact to the user (important so should be given high priority) 4 = Usability catastrophe: problems that prevent user to complete the task or increase the amount of time greatly (imperative to fix this before product can be released)

Inspection Result Due to the task-oriented nature of the website and high numbers of overlapping findings from the Cognitive Walkthrough and Heuristic Evaluation, this lead to the decision of combining the finding into the current format. Presenting the result in this format allow a better flow of information and eliminate redundancy in the document. Pre-combined findings from the Cognitive Walkthrough are provided in the Appendix section of the document. The following sections, Global Issues, Vacation Front Page, Loading Page and Check out are dedicated sections listing the findings from both inspection methods. Additional rationale of this grouping is explained below.

Grouping Similar problem types that exist across the website were grouped in the global issues

section. The recommendation provided in this section provide a guideline to improve an overall usability of the website. The findings were further separate into different screens. This creates a better separation of the findings and creates a flow similar to the task completed in the scenario. List of different screen sectioning are listed below:

• Vacation Front Page – The front page of the vacation link. • Loading Page • Vacation Search Result Page – The result of the vacation search, this includes the

first 3 steps of the 4 steps process provided in this page. • Checkout – This is the Review and Book page. The operation of this page is

ignored due to impossible access of many functions because it is not possible to complete the transaction (credit card purchase required)

To provide the ease of use, Design Dimension and one additional category, Missing Functionality and Technical Problem, were used to categorize the findings. This additional category was added because of the high amount of findings relating to bugs and missing functionality that directly impact the users in achieving the goal. Categories are explained below:

• Missing Functionality and Technical Problems – problems related to missing functionalities that might be required or beneficial to the users and bugs within the website. Due to many encounter of this type of problems, this category is created to better separate technical problems from the design dimensions

• Design Dimensions

o Graphic / Semiotic – problems related to visual designs. o Navigation – problems related to missing or inappropriate links between pages o Information Architecture – problems related to the sectioning of the

information within a page o Operation / Transaction – problems related to availability of the operation and

the appropriateness of the flow of task.

General Issues

1. Inconsistency in graphical elements in different locations of the website.

Heuristic(s) Consistency and Standards

Description Users have to spend time learning how to use different Search Box. User may be come frustrated. This inconsistency could result user to perceive the website as unreliable.

Severity 2

Recommendation Design of the same graphical elements should be consistent across the website

Example(s) See Below

Example 1: Different Search Box design in different pages

Figure 2 Search Box in homepage, session timeout page and page when error occur

Example 2: Different Loading pages in different booking type. (Booking Flight and Vacation)

Figure 3 Different Loading page for Booking Flight and booking Vacation.

Example 3: Different top navigation

Figure 4 Different top navigation in homepage and Vacation Search Result

2. Unclear graphical distinction between clickable and not clickable elements

Heuristic(s) Consistency and Standards

Description Users have to spend time re-reading the Search Box multiple times. This could result frustration in the user. In addition, inconsistent will make user view the site as unreliable. User can be confused on where they are in the website and do not know to go back to the location they were.

Severity 2

Recommendation Design of the same graphical elements should be consistent across the website.


Example 1: Links appear as text

l User will not know that the option is available

Figure 5 Link and text is in the mix. Texts inside the rectangle are links.

Example 2: Logos appear to be clickable however they are not. User have to click “more >>” to get the information

Figure 6 Seem like be able to click logos

Example 3: Advertisement appear as Logo. However this element is not clickable. User has to remember the Discount code and then put it at the end of the booking process.

Figure 7 Not clickable Ads Logo

3. Word that might not convey the object clearly.

Heuristic(s) Match between system and the real world

Description Some word usage might result users in misinterpreting the available or the purpose of some link. They might not recognize or ignore these functions or messages entirely

Severity 3

Recommendation Provide a more descriptive word, for example use “Flight + Hotel + Car” or provide an image that communicates that.


Example 1: The word vacation may not be understood as a combined booking type. If a user would like to book a business trip with a hotel and a car rental, then they might skill this function and book each service separately.

Figure 8 Vacation might not be understood as a combined booking type

Example 2: Confusion between Children and infant

Vacation Front Page

Missing Functionality and Technical Problems

Finding 1: Booking Restrictions: No Flexible Date Option

Heuristic(s) Flexibility and Efficiency of use Consistence and Standard

Description User is not allowed to search with a flexible date. This mean that if they would like to find the cheapest flight within a month they have to search, note the price on a piece paper and repeat that for 30 times. Then compare their result. In addition, user may get confused because flexible date option is available in Booking Flight.

Severity 4

Recommendation Provide flexible date option for Vacation booking. Screenshot See Below

No Flexible date option, which is provided in Flight. This is inconsistent with the Booking Flight option.

Figure 9 Flexible date option is not available in Booking Vacation option

Finding 2: Booking Restrictions: Do not allow to book vacation which is more than 30 days apart

Heuristic(s) Flexibility and Efficiency of use

Consistence and Standard

Description User is not allowed to booking round-trip flights, which are more 30 days apart. If they would like to achieve this, they have to book the departure and return flight separately.

Severity 3

Recommendation Provide user with more flexibility, for example increase allowed range to 60 days.

Screenshot See Below

Figure 10 Do not allow to book vacation which is more than 30 days apart

Finding 3: Identical Top Navigation and Search Box

Heuristic(s) Aesthetic and Minimalist design

Description User can get confused on the differences of the link and might try to click all of them just to find out that they provide the same functionality.

Severity 2

Recommendation Select only one way to choose between each type of booking


Figure 11 Identical links for the top navigation and the search box

Finding 4: No autocomplete for Airline selection

Heuristic(s) Flexibility and efficiency of use

Consistency and Standard

Match between system and the real world

Description User cannot type in the Airline name in the preferred airline option like the way they type in the name of the airport. User might get confused and attempt to type the name of the airline. Even if they user realize that airline code is required, user does not remember airlines by codes so they will have to look through a long list of airline to complete this task.

Severity 2

Recommendation Allow the user to type in the name of the airline with auto-complete function.


Figure 12 User have to find the Airline Code

Finding 5: No Indicator where the error occurs

Heuristic(s) Visibility of System Status

Description Users cannot immediately recognize where to correct the error.

Severity 1

Recommendation Provide graphical indication where the error occurs, for example, highlight the Adult, Children and Children ages dropdowns.

Screenshot

Figure 13 System do not indicate where the error occurs

Graphic / Semiotic

Finding 6: No Clear differences in different mode of booking


Description Each type of booking, Business & First Class, Vacation, shows a very similar Search Box. User can get confused and do search on different type of booking than intended.

Severity 1

Recommendation Improve the graphical indication of different type of booking the user is using, for example using different background color for different type of booking.

Screenshot

Figure 14 Minor difference in different type of booking

Content

Finding 7: Booking Restriction: Do not give information on how user could recover.

Heuristic(s) Help users recognize, diagnose and recover errors

Description User are not allow to perform some task, however there is no guidance regarding how the user can achieve the task that they wanted. User might not be willing to book separately because they might not be able to get the same flight.

Severity 2

Recommendation Inform user the number of people they can book before they start the search or prevent user from the selecting more than the allowed number. Provide information how user can book more than the number allowed, for example, “For booking for more than 6 people, please contact Group Booking <link>”.



Finding 8: No Indicator where the error occurs


Description Users have to spend time finding where the error occurs.

Severity 1

Recommendation Highlight the input where the errors occur


Loading Page

Graphics / Semiotic

Finding 9: Loading Page Progress is not visible.

Heuristic(s) Visibility of the System Status

Description The progress indicator, dots at the bottom of the page, is not visible to the user. User may think that the system stopped or get confused that they are in the wrong place and go back to home page just to find out that there is nothing wrong.

Severity 3

Recommendation Insert some more prominent indicator, for example the loading for Booking Flight.


Figure 17 Difficult to see progress indication (Inside the rectangle is the dots process indicator)

Finding 10: The important search information is not visible

Heuristic(s) Aesthetic and minimal design

Description User may not recognize search input, such as to and from airport, selected date, due to its similarity to the surrounding advertisement text.

Severity 1

Recommendation Make this information graphically more distinctive, for example by changing the color, and place it directly below the OneTravel logo.


Figure 18 Search information is not visible

Navigation

Finding 11: There is no exit from the Loading page.

Heuristic(s) User Control and Freedom

Description Users cannot exit or cancel search from the loading page. They might close the website altogether.

Severity 2

Recommendation Provide user with home link or cancel link to allow user exit the loading page.

Screenshot N/A

Vacation Search Result


Finding 12: Sort by requested time doesn't sort flight by requested time


Description When selecting a flight, user can choose to sort the result by price, distance and requested time. However this function will not sort by requested time. User can get confused why the flight result shown are not sorted by time.

Severity 4

Recommendation Sort the search result by time.


The requested time below is 11am, however the result begins with 5:10am

Figure 19 Wrong sorting when choosing sort by requested time.

Finding 13: No Multiple Hotels map view

Heuristic(s) User Control and Freedom Description User cannot view all hotels in the single map. This makes it very

difficult for the user to compare location of each hotel in the result. If they would like to compare each hotel then they have to print the map out and then mark the location and price of interested hotels.

Severity 4

Recommendation Provide map functionality, which show all the hotels in the search result in a single map.


Figure 20 Only show one hotel location at a time

Finding 14: No option to change search

Heuristic(s) User Control and Freedom Consistency and Standard

Description User cannot makes changes to the search input, e.g. date, destination, when they are in the Vacation Search Result. User has to browse back to home page to begin their search process again. In addition, this is provided in all other type of booking,

Severity 2

Recommendation Provide a table similar to the Booking Flight that allow user to change date.

Screenshot N/A

Finding 15: Breadcrumb cannot be click

Heuristic(s) User Control and Freedom

Description If the user wishes to go back the previous step they might not know how. They might have to go back to the homepage and start the process from the beginning.

Severity 2

Recommendation Provide a link in the breadcrumb so that user can go back to make chances in the previous steps.


Figure 21 Not clickable breadcrumb

Finding 16: No Session Expiration Indication

Heuristic(s) Visibility of the system status

Description Users do not know when the session is going to be expired. After they put a lot of effort into looking through the search result, they might have to do it again if the session expired.

Severity 2

Recommendation Provide indicator when session is about to expire. Screenshot N/A

Finding 17: Start New Search takes user to a different page.


Description User can get confused why they are not return to the same place where they comes from. User might be confused and have to go back to home

Severity 2

Recommendation “Start New Search” should take user back to the Home Page


›

Figure 22 Start New Search Button in Vacation Search Result.

Figure 23 Start New Search take user to a wrong page.

Graphic / Semiotic

Finding 18: Important buttons and links are not design to be prominent

Heuristic(s) Aesthetic and Minimalist Design

Consistency and Standards

Description The system does not provide graphical emphasis on the important buttons. Many buttons have a secondary importance, however, it was design to be as eye-catching as button with the higher importance. In addition, there are many competing sections of information inside one page. User might not know what is the thing they are required to do in order to achieve their goal.

Severity 3

Recommendation Put graphical emphasis on higher importance buttons and links. Reduce the number of information and task that the user can do at each step


Figure 24 Important buttons and links.

Figure 25 Secondary buttons and links.

Navigation

Finding 19: Session timeout take user to a different search page, rather than where user came from, homepage.

Heuristic(s) Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors

Description When session timeout happen, user will be redirected to another page, which is not where they do the search. The user might get confused and have to figure out the way back to the Vacation Search Result page. User has to repeat the process all over.

Severity 3

Recommendation As the user logs in it might be saved in the profile as the most recent search


Figure 26 Session time out take user to a wrong page.

Finding 20: No Link to help from vacation page

Heuristic(s) Help and documentation

Description No help or FAQ links are provided from the vacation page. Severity 2

Recommendation Provide ways for the user to access help page from the vacation search result page.

Screenshot N/A

Information Architecture

Finding 21: Difficulty in comparing Flight Search Result in long list.

Heuristic(s) Flexibility and efficiency of use

User Control and Freedom Aesthetic and minimalist design Recognition rather than recall

Description There are many attributes that the users might use to compare each flight, e.g. time, price, layover time, date. However the flight information is listed in a long list, which does not provide any help the user in comparing each result. The user might have to list all the result out on a paper with interested attributes in a grid and try to make sense of the result and then select the best one.

Severity 4

Recommendation Provide a way to structure the result differently regarding to the multiple interested attributes, for example, they system can provide user a grid view of the result showing differences of the time against price.


Figure 27 Cropped 10% magnification of the search result.

(Search result can be 10,000 pixel long

Finding 22: Vacation Detail is put under Hotel Detail


Description Vacation Details includes information about flight detail, hotel detail and car details. User might realize that these information, flight detail and car detail, are under Hotel Detail heading.

Severity 1

Recommendation Improve the hierarchy of information within Hotel Detail, for example, flight and car details can be put in a separate section


Figure 28 Flight Details and Car Details are place

in the same hierarchy as the information about the hotel.

Operational / Transaction

Finding 23: Confusing 4 steps task separation

Heuristic(s) Match Between system and the real world

Description The 4 steps required to complete the vacation booking process is difficult to understand. The steps outlined also missed some vital parts of the process e.g. choosing flight and choosing car rental. The user might not understand and wonder how and where to choose their flight and car rental.

Severity 4

Recommendation Provide a better separation of the tasks which matches the real world, for example, the task can be separated in to 5 steps, choose your flight, choose your hotel, choose your car, choose your add-on and review and book. The trade-off of having one additional step, however this will a lot easier to understand


Figure 29 Booking vacation is separated into 4 steps, Select Package, Select Room Type, Select add-ons

and review and book.

Finding 24: No explanation why Checkout Button is disabled

Heuristic(s) Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors

Description There is no explanation why the Checkout button is disabled. At checkout, user can get stuck not knowing what they have missed.

Severity 3

Recommendation Provide an explanation of the task that the user have to do before they can finish the check out. By Improving problem (36), better task separation, this might no longer be a problem


Figure 30 Checkout is disabled in Step 1 and Step 2

Checkout Page


Finding 25: User cannot choose flight seat

Finding 26: No Facebook Login option

Heuristic(s) Consistency and Standard

Description There is no Facebook Login button in vacation checkout. User who sign up to the website will not be able to login. This is because these user do not know their email and password to the website. They have to go the their account management page to find out about the email address of their account. Then use the Forget Password function to reset their password.

Severity 3

Recommendation The system should be consistent in the availability of the options provided in the website. Otherwise it should provide a similar method to sign up.


Heuristic(s) User control and freedom

Description User cannot choose the seat. If they want to select seat then, they may choose an alternative site to book their trip.

Severity 4

Recommendation Provide an option for user to choose seat. Screenshot N/A

Figure 31 User can only login with their email and password.

Graphics / Semiotics

Finding 27: Seat preference settings and meal plan are important and should be visible.


Description The user searches for the seating plan, meal option and recalls that such important info can only be uncovered by clicking on a link.

Severity 3

Recommendation The important options should always visible. Screenshot See Below

Figure 32 Seat Preferences, Meal Preferences are hidden under additional requests.

Synopsis OneTravel.com is one of the best travel website catering to a large and diverse users base. It provides many new features that greatly help the users in finding what they want. But we encountered various problems in our usability inspection process, which if resolved will make the website better and more accessible to the user. Here we are describing the problems according to their severity ratings.

Severity Rating Number of Problems 1 6 2 11 3 8 4 6

Severity 1 2 3 4 Global issues - 2 1 Missing functionality & Technical problems

1 6 2 4

Graphics/Semiotic 2 - 3 - Content 1 1 - - Navigation 1 2 1 - Information Architecture

1 - - 1

Operation/Transaction - - 1 1

Appendixes

Scenarios Created & Associated Tasks

OneTravel website target any users who wish to booking the services; therefore, different user profile was not created. The 4 scenario that have been created are listed below:

1. Bill is a masters student at IUPUI. He is 24 years old. He study in HCI program and is

very skilled programmer. Right now Chin is Flat Broke but he wants to go to L.A. Since the transportation in L.A. is really bad he would like to rent a car for the whole period of time. He also would like to book a hotel, however, he will be visited by his girlfriend so he would like to stay in a 5-star hotel on that day. Tasks (using the Vacation booking type)

1. Find a cheapest round-trip flights from Indianapolis to L.A. in December, the date is flexible, however the return flight must be 4 days after the departure flight.

2. Book a cheapest hotel for 3 days 3. Book another hotel (5 star) for 1 day. 4. Rent a cheapest car for 4 days

2. Jeremy is a businessman and his company pays for his flight ticket. Therefore he does

not care how expensive the price is but he just wants the flight to be comfortable and convenient. Comfortable mean that he wants a ticket which is a Business Class or a First Class. He only fly with British Airways. He is also a vegetarian who likes to sit next to the windows.

Tasks (Using the business and first class booking type)

1. Book a flight ticket in a business class or first class. 2. Choose British Airways as the preferred airline. 3. Emphasize on the comfort and convenience factor while selecting a flight. 4. Choose a vegetarian meal. 5. Choose a window seat.

3. Lisa is 65 years old and lives in South Africa. Her children live in New York. She knows the basics of checking her email, sending mails and browsing websites. She also has a Facebook profile. She has never bought anything online. She never travel with an airplane. She wants to visit her children in New York in the Summer. She looks for an easy way to book a ticket. But she is concerned about online payments and would like to get explanation of the whole process (Booking process and Cancellation). Tasks

1. Locate the menu to reach customer service. 2. Choose between various customer support provided. 3. Find out how to book a ticket. 4. The type of payment to be used.

4. Nora has been assigned by her professor to book a research group trip. So Hsiao Wen would like to do some research on possible destinations in or out of the US. She heard that OneTravel have a good quality blog and so she would like to find more information there. There are 6 people in her research group. After she booked the flight, she found out that another 2 professors will be joining the trip. However, the flight booked for 6 members is full, so she need to find another flight which will land at the same airport within 1 hours time. Tasks (Using the flight booking for groups)

1. Book 6 seats that should be next to each other. a.Home page > Search Now > Book b.No seats map when choosing seat for group travel c.Search result banners are not clear. d.Banner wording incorrect

2. Find alternative flight that will arrive at the same airport at the same day and

time (within 1 hour) a.Home page > Search Now > Book b.Time sorting for search results confuse user.

Cognitive Walkthrough Result The problems from Cognitive Walkthrough that were discovered by the inspectors:

• The page has too much information. • The naming of the tab Vacation is not appropriate in the web page to predict its

functionality. The user easily knows that vacation tab needs to be used while doing multiple bookings. There is potential problem that user goes through the normal booking process and does bookings multiple times. - User might go on and do the booking separately

• There is no option for the user to sort results for destinations within a month with the cheapest fare. To find a flight within a month with the cheapest fare; the search needs to be conducted for all the days in a month (30 times). And needs to be compared manually by noting on a piece of paper.

• There is no visibility like animation, textual feedbacks etc. in the loading page. The loading page looks like advertisement. It gives no feedback to the user and the user might end up thinking there is no progress and close the window. Due to its static nature the user gets an impression that it is a pop up page.

• The Search result shows (feeds in) too much information, user might be confused of what to action needs to be performed next. There is a bad consistency of button placement. The buttons do not have any hierarchy i.e. they look the same. There is no sign which shows which are more important than the other.

• The next step button is not clear. • The listing of Hotel in the search result is difficult to compare. There is no easy

comparison or sorting by location. • The separation of steps in vacation page is not convenient for the user. The sequence

of selection cannot be controlled by the user. The user needs to select the flight first and then the hotel. If the user wants to begin a new search they are taken to a new page different from the previous ones. If the user does not trust the system then they will have to search flight, hotel and car individually, note the prices on the paper and then compare them to the vacation result

• The Navigation Problem. By clicking on the start new search leads the user to a different page.

usability inspection report on

Documents

inspection methods

heuristic inspection

inspection result

clickable elements

graphical elements

different mode of booking

different locations

unclear graphical distinction