CASE STUDY
Disney Vacation Club — Digital Transformation
Expanding DVC’s industry-first purchase processes into fully self-servicing online experiences.
Modernization of purchase processes for current DVC Members
Timeline
2022 - 2024, 3 phase release plan
Key Skills
Wireframing, Prototyping, Sprint + process management, stakeholder management, Engineering collaboration
Disney Vacation Club is a vacation timeshare program that allows guests to “own” Disney resort accommodations through a point system. The purchase process for Members to add a timeshare location to their membership is completely in-person or over the phone with a DVC Guide.
Moving away from in-person processes, DVC is creating a buyer-enabled ecosystem allowing Members to have more control and awareness throughout the buying, selling and management of their timeshare properties.
My focus was designing new self-servicing experiences for our Member Add-On tool, the Contract Management systems, and ongoing management tools around Payments & Transactions.
My Role | Collaborators
Product Designer | Lead Product Designer, Product Manager, Project Manager, Copy team, Engineering, Accounting, Legal, Customer Service
Tools
Figma, Hyperion
PROJECT KICKOFF
Our Challenge & Goal
How might we support the ongoing DVC Member growth and brand development while providing Guests with seamless, intuitive processes that reflect the overall Disney brand experience?
Design Strategy
Our goal was to design entirely new product offerings that enhance sales opportunities and optimize closings for both Cast Members and Guests.
Working heavily with cross-functional DVC teams was important to outline an approach that successfully guided DVC Members through this new process, involving three new areas.
We focused on designing (1) the way Guests initially became aware they could purchase additional timeshares, (2) “escrow” and the contract process (DVC refers to this stage as “Deposit Payments”), and (3) the continuous management of the timeshare which includes annual loans and dues payments.
PROCESS
Current Purchase Flow
These three areas of the Member purchase process required design to collaborate heavily with not just tech teams, but many DVC teams like Guest Services, Accounting, Financing, and Loans & Dues Management. These teams were all Guest-facing services that are currently involved in the purchase flow, that would now be handing off their Member touchpoints to this self-service upgrade.
We facilitated multiple design-focused workshops where we outlined current processes, potential new flows, and identified areas of new design with other DVC teams and Tech. Throughout these workshops, we questioned ways we could provide Members with the necessary information to move forward at each step without overwhelming them, balancing user choice with guidance.
Experience Flow
Each touchpoint area that we outlined earlier would correspond with different Member expectations. At the beginning stages (Add-On Tool), Members would want to know pricing, contract opening timeline and have resort-specific questions, while Members at the end of the contract management stages or have properties they’re making payments on, might be familiarized with the flow as they continuously check their contract status online or make payments on their account.
For this initial release our average user, Many Visits Megan, would represent a current DVC Member. This is someone who has gone through the process with a DVC Guide before, so the density of information is lighter than an onboarding member.
Member-Cast Relationship
Taking a face-to-face process completely digital required us to deeply understand the relationship between the average DVC Member and Cast Member. The task of buying any property can be long and dense, so we wanted to fully understand when Members might need the most guidance and where there is room to be more hands-off from the service side. I was constantly circling back to this relationship to fully understand any conflicts that might arise throughout the process. Ultimately, there were many user stories that highlighted where things might go wrong for Members, especially surround Contract Status or the Payments flow.
ADD-ON ALERT
Member Eligibility
The existing Member Add-On calculator is used by Guests to calculate costs of specific properties given the amount of Vacation Points used. For this area of the site, to help notify DVC Members of their eligibility for adding onto their existing ownership, we used an existing alert style above the points calculator. This allowed guests to see, without interruption, opportunities for expanding their memberships.
We also provided an alert style to show Guests resorts they have already submitted contract requests for, steering potential errors away from Guest Services.
CONTRACT MANAGEMENT
Deposit Payment Status
Most of the project focused on the Contract (Deposit Payment) process, which is essentially escrow in outside property investment.
Members have a new online account dashboard that would hold all information and management regarding this part of the purchase flow. This includes a “Contract Status” that illustrates to Members what step their deposit payment is— requested, in progress for approval, open and ready for payments, and finalized/closed.
Other modules on the page include the Make a Payment view and Upcoming Payments. These displays allow Members to schedule payments, pay now, and view upcoming or missed payments.
ONGOING ACTIONS
Make a Payment
Because users could now pay online towards their “escrow” contract, a new payment flow was designed. We leveraged existing DVC payment flows from the Loans & Dues department, adding new features like schedule a future payment. I collaborated closely with our tech teams to add new real-time behaviors to our Automatic Payment System. Below is a general overview of the happy-flows and pages for Make a Payment.
Transaction History
Throughout the Deposit Payment process, Members need to view a payment history or a rundown of potential upcoming payments for proper management.
The challenge here was balancing what a Member would be used to viewing for transactional histories or receipts in other areas of DVC, like Annual Loans and Dues, while providing an updated experience. Additionally, we needed to keep in mind what payment information Cast Members would see on the backend. Ideally there are similarities in the information displayed for both Cast and Member pulled from our OMS, but concise enough for Members that important information wouldn’t get drowned out.
Following similar brand patterns for DVC, the Summary and Payment History pages were used to hold any financial information for Members’ Deposit Payments (Contracts). The top table of the page represented a quick “snapshot” of payments information, including total amount paid and total amount left on the contract. As users went down the page they could then get a more in depth view of each payment, how their money was allocated, and the option to edit or cancel payments.
Constraints & Retrospective
To me this project highlighted the importance of cross-team collaboration and the intricate challenges that come with a long-haul timeline. Because there were so many phases of designs for such a long user journey, it took a lot of direct communication with tech to understand what data and systems would be involved at every step.
Taking an in-person experience completely digital is a large undertaking. Relying heavily on understanding the current service design and the actual relationship with DVC Guides and their Members was imperative to replicate a digital experience that could ease decision making and alleviate inconsistencies that come up in manual effort. Putting emphasis on the research phase and continuously workshopping with teams, we were able to achieve this in our final designs.