How app favourites personalise the Passenger experience

Personalisation is a key product strategy at Passenger. Designing technology to aid the customer experience can be complex, but getting it right can pay huge dividends by opening up new ways for people to get around reliably.

Enabling individuals to apply their preferences helps to hand a sense of control to customers over their journey. Filtering information down to only what is relevant turns a good experience into a great one; reducing friction and increasing customer delight. A system that not only provides detailed generalised information but also adapts to individual needs takes us on the road towards the holy grail in the world of transit apps — a much better experience than driving yourself.

Uniquely in the UK, bus operators joining Passenger’s customer experience platform enjoy the benefit of proven features resulting from long-term iteration in front of millions of users across nearly 100 operators.

We began this journey in 2016 by launching a ‘minimum viable’ favourites capability into the Passenger app — enabling regular stops, journeys and routes to be bookmarked. Ever since, we have steadily evolved it, delivering improvements through iterative releases. This article looks at the subtle changes we’ve made over the years, which, combined, deliver a personalisation capability that works for hundreds of thousands of users every day.

Automatic focus in Explore view

After studying users’ behaviour at their regular stops, it became clear that we could save users a tap if they had favourited a nearby stop. In most cases, the user would want immediate access to the real-time departures for this stop. In the Melon release (2017 was the year of fruit-related releases!), we automatically set the focus on the favourite stop if the user is within 50 metres of it.

Widgets

Later in 2017, we added home screen widgets on Android so that users could quickly access the departure board for their favourite stops. We also added in-app widget prompts, heralding their availability to users after they had added a favourite in the app.

Live buses on Explore view

In 2018, we used favourites in a novel way in a new settings interface for live bus tracking, accessible directly from the app’s main Explore view. Following the release, customers could quickly discover the app’s live buses and control which routes showed. The selection method reduced the taps needed to personalise the view, which is the default screen shown at launch. The selection is stored as the customer’s favourite services, with these subsequently highlighted in other parts of the application.

Device syncing

One of the most significant updates to date was the introduction of automatic Favourites synchronisation across apps and websites in late 2018. This was launched as part of bringing the capability to the web. The update provided the backbone of a cross-platform experience by creating a familiar environment for customers as they experienced the application through different interfaces.

This was enabled by introducing the existing mobile app user account to the web. Importantly, customers did not need to create an account to use favourites on their devices. A user account ensures syncing where the customer uses the app across multiple devices, but it remains optional.

Setting Favourites as the start screen

In the summer of 2019, we introduced a concept that improved the app experience, where users paid for travel in alternative ways and did not buy a ticket in the app itself. With the release, customers could personalise the app launch screen according to their preferences. This means that when they open the app, it will automatically start on the chosen screen—any one of Explore, Favourites, Journey Planner, Mobile Tickets, or Things to Do—making it quicker to access the part of the app they use the most.

This enables customers who use an alternative way to pay for their travel or those entitled to free travel, such as those under 22 in Scotland, to prioritise access to their favourite stops, journeys and routes.

Favourite stop visibility in timetables

In May this year, we added even more visibility to favourites in timetables — a popular view for alternative journey planning. Favourite stops are now highlighted with the familiar star icon and displayed in timetables regardless of whether they are major or minor. Where a stop is not a favourite, it will display according to the user’s active major/minor display preferences. This release has made it easier for customers to identify their favourite stops when viewing a timetable quickly. A subtle but important enhancement, making the interface easy to scan.

Thanks to feedback from over 2 million monthly active users and nearly 100 operators in the Passenger network, we’re already working on our next update for favourites. We think it’s our most powerful addition yet, and we can’t wait to release it later this year. Keep your eyes peeled for more information — join our mailing list below to be the first to hear.