For this project, I was assigned a designer and asked to create content for a user journey that would explain payment discrepancies in invoices. The UI would include how to calculate the correct invoice amount that shippers pay carriers based on contracts, rate standards, and freight documents.
Loop’s previous user-facing system did not show how discrepancies are found or calculated, and therefore auditing results or flagged payment discrepancies were considered illegitimate and unverifiable. This explainability project would solidify Loop’s main product feature of automating freight invoice processing and flagging discrepancies for shippers and third-party brokerages.
This was the previous form of explainability on rate discrepancies. The design for this particular version felt chaotic because the user had to review each amount on this side panel that took up 1/8 of your screen. The panel displayed various amounts, but there were no references or attached documents that the user could rely on to verify if the amounts were correct.
Options to pay the invoice are displayed entirely under each line item, with additional or subtracted amounts on the side — this creates a cluttered call to action for the user. These options were presented for every section of the invoice, which would be incredibly time-consuming for the user considering the volume of invoices that shippers and third-party brokerages would normally deal with on a daily basis.
Based on the previous designs, we started by having microcopy include shipment details that would identify the invoice, the expected costs, and the source of truth for each rate.
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To research what audits took place within Loop and how each audit came to completion and verification, I had to rely on cross-functional collaboration to provide the missing data points of this project. Here are the people I consulted with and what we learned from each team member.
- learned what validates an audit, components of the internal audit tool to hide or show the user
- listed out the documents necessary to validate an audit that the user will look for, what sources go into calculating line items
- learned how the system completes an audit and extracts data from an invoice
- collected necessary documents to calculate line items depending on the type of shipment
- as someone who works directly with customers, receives client feedback, and conducts user demos, I learned what expectations users had of the interface and customer reactions to aspects of the product workflow
- clarified user personas and pain points
- clarified the calls to action that we expect from the user, and how Loop wants to guide them through discrepancies, document verification, and invoice identification
- provided feedback on the prototype and how to best create fluidity with the current product's design and UI/UX
