Case Study: Reimagining the “Dispute Wizard”
Sepehr Alimagham • Product Designer
Overview🧙♂️
Redesigning the Dispute Wizard for Credit Repair Cloud (CRC) was a transformative project aimed at improving one of the platform's core features.
This tool is vital for Credit Repair Operators (CROs) as it enables them to generate credit reports, identify inaccuracies, and create disputes for their clients.
The existing Dispute Wizard was cluttered and inefficient, making the process cumbersome for users. My goal was to overhaul the feature, streamlining the workflow and enhancing usability.
The original "dispute wizard" was cluttered, confusing and misleading.Challenges 🫣
Redesigning the Dispute Wizard presented several challenges:
Complexity of Existing Workflow: The original wizard was dense with unnecessary buttons, steps, and modals, creating a steep learning curve for users.
Multiple Entry Points: The wizard could be accessed from various parts of the product, but the main entry point was the client dashboard. Ensuring a seamless experience across these touchpoints was crucial.
User Decision Fatigue: Users were overwhelmed by the number of choices they had to make, particularly during the tagging process of the credit report.
Integration with Existing Systems: The wizard had to interact smoothly with other CRC components, including the client list and letter generation tools.
Status Tracking: Managing and displaying the different states of the dispute process, such as sent letters and pending responses, added to the complexity.
Discovery & Research 👨🔬
To kick off the project, I collaborated with my PM to conduct a discovery phase. While PMs typically led discovery at CRC, I advocated for a more design-inclusive approach, believing it would yield better insights and more user-centered designs. Through user interviews, feedback analysis, and a thorough review of the existing system, we identified key pain points and user needs.
User Overwhelm: CROs felt overwhelmed by the number of steps and options in the current Dispute Wizard.
Guided Actions: Users preferred guidance on which items to dispute first, rather than having to make all the decisions themselves.
Streamlined Process: A step-by-step, wizard-like interface was more appealing and easier to navigate.
Understanding The Current System 💻
I needed to map out the current feature in the product to understand what all of the possible actions were as well as how all of the objects in the system were related to each other. The previous Dispute Wizard system was cluttered and disorganized, with actions and statuses spread across various locations. This disarray made it challenging for users to navigate through the dispute resolution process effectively.
Feature Mapping 🗺️
To address this issue, I began by mapping out the current features of the product. This comprehensive mapping was crucial to understand the various statuses and actions that a user could encounter. The statuses I identified included (but were not reflected in current product’s messaging):
Imported but not submitted
Imported and tagged but not sent
Sent and awaiting status update
Received status update
No reply received
The actions associated with these statuses were:
Submit letter
Tag report
Send follow-up letter
Request status update
By visualizing the flow and relationships between these statuses and actions, I was able to create a clear, logical progression for the user.
Design Solutions 📝
With these insights, I started on redesigning the Dispute Wizard with a focus on velocity, usability, and efficiency
1. Streamlined Workflow 🏃♀️
I reimagined the Dispute Wizard to function as a true step-by-step guide. Users would initiate the process from various touchpoints within the product, including a dedicated drawer accessible from the client list. This approach ensured that the wizard was always within easy reach, reducing the need to navigate through dense menus
2. High-Impact Item Selection 🎯
One of the most impactful changes was the introduction of a system that pre-selects high-impact items for dispute.
Instead of requiring users to manually tag each item, the wizard now highlights the most significant discrepancies, simplifying the decision-making process. This feature was well-received by stakeholders and addressed a major pain point for CROs.
3. Clear and Intuitive UI 🧠
Drawing inspiration from user-friendly applications like Asana and Jira, I designed the wizard with a clean, intuitive interface.
Key actions were prominently displayed, and unnecessary buttons and modals were removed. The design adhered to usability standards and heuristics, ensuring a natural mapping that made the feature feel familiar and easy to use.
4. Clarity of All States / System Statuses 👁️🗨️
In designing the Dispute Wizard, I ensured that all possible system states were clearly communicated to the user. Whether returning to the wizard or activating it for the first time, users were informed if a new report was needed or if no action was necessary due to a report being pulled within the last 30 days. Additionally, the status of each dispute was prominently displayed, providing transparency and ease of understanding for users at every step.
Implementation and Trade-offs 🎭
As with most redesigns, there were trade-offs to balance:
Feature Prioritization: While I wanted to include advanced features like version history for letter drafts, we prioritized core functionality to ensure a timely rollout.
For MVP, we needed to focus on rolling out the dispute wizard as soon as possible, so I had to sacrifice some features that would tie into our roadmap, like AI letter generation.
Performance Considerations: Enhancing the tagging and letter generation functionalities introduced potential performance concerns. We optimized backend processes to maintain system responsiveness.
Anticipated Impact and Reflection 😌
The redesign of the Dispute Wizard marked a significant step forward for CRC. The streamlined workflow, intuitive UI, and high-impact item selection promised to enhance user satisfaction and efficiency. Feedback from stakeholders and initial user testing was overwhelmingly positive, indicating that the redesign was on the right track.
This project reinforced the importance of user-centered design and the value of collaboration in creating impactful solutions. It was a challenging yet rewarding experience that honed my skills in managing complex design projects within a dense and multifaceted product ecosystem.