Creating usable self-service interactions

In today´s economy, more and more of our transactions with organizations to research and purchase products and services are self-service; they involve no interaction with a human being. This paper explores people´s experiences both with self-service transactions and with processes where the interaction migrates from self-service to human mediation. Two case histories from the author´s consulting firm describe user research and interaction design to improve the usability of self-service transactions.