Teach me something with the bills

Daniele Catalanotto
Nov 16, 2022
A Service Design Principle about customer education

I get a bill from the bank that gives me my credit card. It's one of these pre-paid cards where I have to add money to an account to be able to use. So from time to time, the bank sends me an empty "check" so that I can add money to my account to refill the credit card.

As I recieve one of the bills, I notice a little text in it that says: "Tip". It then explains that I could make a copy of the reference numbers and bank account information in my ebanking so that I don't have to retype all of this by hand everytime. Smart.



This bank is smart. It uses an interaction that already exists to teach me something. It's also super smart to put that additional pro tip on a bill. Bills are the types of document you read from start to finish to be sure you don't get fucked over in the fine print. But what if the fine print adds extra value? That's exactly what this bank does.
 
So let me ask.
What's an interaction you already have with your customers that you know they are deeply focused on? How could you add valuable information to this interaction so that people learn something that will make their life easier in the future?

Daniele's notes

  • This is the very first "thinking aloud" draft of this Service Design Principle.
  • Once reworked a few times, it might end up in one of the books of the Service Design Principles series.
  • Do you have other examples or opposing thoughts that could help me improve this idea?