I recently used the IVR (Interactive Voice Response) system of an organization tasked with issuing identity cards to citizens. An IVR system is supposed to improve customer experience besides helping the organization in managing complaints,requests etc. Therefore,it plays a very important role. An IVR system comprises one or multiple menus which are read out to a caller who then has to select one of the options. Interestingly, sometimes there are just so many options that one just loses tracks. It also happens when the “menu items” do not sound similar to what the called user has in mind. So what do you do? You just navigate to the one that sounds closest to what you had in mind and hope that it will solve your problem or you wait for the option to talk to a staff on the other side!
The IVR system that I referred to earlier had peculiar issues. If you selected the option that said something similar to “I would like to know if I need to reapply”, you would expect it to prompt you to give some information based on which you would be told “whether or not” you should reapply. However, this IVR system would give the response similar to “Please do not reapply as it is not desirable to have two identity numbers”. Now how on earth is that helpful?
The IVR system of a prominent smartphone company would give some even more hilarious responses. When you call the number hoping to find a relevant menu or speak to someone, it would tell you something similar to “Please visit our website to resolve your issue”. Now imagine that for some reason you do not have access to internet, then is that response of any help? Absolutely not.
This begs the question about the people (engineers, manager, UI guys etc.) involved in designing IVR systems. Do they really understand how people use a language to communicate? Do they spend some time understanding the common phrases that people use to refer to their issues and then distill a subset that they can use in their system? Do they spend time brainstorming proper responses to different kinds of questions? A good IVR system is not just a software development exercise. It involves understanding about communication and is affected by the communication skills of the team doing the design. Similarly, an IVR system with multiple menus and sub-menus can get difficult to navigate especially for old people. Does the design team understand who the end users are and what kind of communication skills they have? I think these are important questions that should be considered. An IVR system is supposed to provide an easy solution to a user. It should be simple, straight and elegant.
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