Easy Dine

A digital platform that assists dine-in customers to communicate with restaurant staff instantly and smoothly, offering a better overall dine-in experience.

Role

  • UX Researcher
  • UX Designer
  • University of Washington

Overview

For over two years, the pandemic has limited social interactions, including dining out. To adapt, restaurants reduced human interaction by relying on doorstep delivery, mobile apps, and online tools, often eliminating face-to-face communication entirely.

While the pandemic continues to pose health risks, people still crave social connection. Balancing essential communication and restaurant etiquette with minimal interaction has proven challenging, leading to negative experiences for both staff and customers.

This project identified key communication pain points in dine-in settings and developed a solution seamlessly integrated into existing restaurant systems. The result is improved staff-customer communication, better service, and an enhanced dining experience.

Research

”How might we improve communication between the dining-in customers and the restaurant staff when customers need assistance?

Research Methods

Desk Research

Surveys

User Interviews

Key Insights

When ordering food, around 41.2% of the participants from our survey chose to communicate directly to the staff
When asking for assistance, more than half of the participants (57.4%) preferred to ask for assistance through the device provided by the restaurant
Participants mentioned that being notified of the service status at a restaurant would allow dining in customers to be more patient, improving the customer experience.
The dining experience does not limit to the service the restaurant provides, rather the entire experience is what is critical, from entering the restaurant to exiting.

Design Questions

  • How can a device effectively address and adapt to various types of service assistance requested by customers?
  • How can a device notify dine-in customers about the status of their service?
  • How can a device deliver information in a succinct and direct manner while maintaining clarity and relevance for users?
  • How can a device effectively visualize the expected wait time for service assistance?

User Personas

Design

Design Goals

Efficient
  • Shorten the time of ordering and paying
  • Avoid ineffective communication between customers and the staff
  • Provide immediate response to service requests
Intuitive
  • Make things easy for users
  • Provide clear guidance
  • Low learning cost
Flexible
  • Customize users’ needs
  • Allow users to amend orders or other needs
  • Provide multiple choices for paying
Consistent
  • Follow user’s common habits of using other similar devices
  • Provide visually consistent elements on user interfaces

Storyboarding

Key Features

Ordering with Special Requests
  • Minimizes common order mistakes typically made during in-person transactions.
  • Enables users to visually confirm their special requests, ensuring accuracy and seamless communication with the kitchen and wait staff.
Asking for Assistance
  • Displays the most common restaurant requests, while allowing customization to accommodate individual needs.
  • Uses simple icons to provide users with an intuitive and immediate understanding of their requests.
Paying the Bill
  • Offers clear and simple guidance for users to make payments, including the total cost per person when splitting the bill.