Discover

Abstract

This project will give an idea of how current restaurants carry on their booking activities and try to improve the services by making table booking services through mobile applications in Sri Lanka. This will eliminate the time taken in queues by customers and save on resources such as extra expenses for hiring new employees to restaurants for the increasing number of customers.

Aim

Reserve a table via a mobile-friendly app to get into the desired restaurant in Sri Lanka. Prevent the no-show and overbooking.

Objectives

1. Provide a search engine with the availability of tables.

2. Avoid overbooking and no-shows.

3. Provide a satisfactory system to both restaurants and diners.

Problem

People mostly don’t like queues they want to complete all of their work quickly without any disturbance but with the fullest satisfaction. Taking any kind of service as a final point depends on trust and satisfaction.

There are lots of table booking online systems available around the world, my concern is making this system successful in Sri Lanka because we don’t have any systems to support customers to catch up with their desired table in their favorite restaurant in a good manner.

· Not Taking Reservations or Limiting Them

The smallest restaurants don’t take reservations frequently people come and go they always rush, but sometimes need to wait for an hour or more for a table, maybe can get a table or have to step back into another place for finding a table.

· Overbooking

When it’s come to overbooking sure a restaurant can reserve a table for two parties either one no-show up or it can be allocated for another one. Those people don’t keep waiting tables that had been allocated for them at a certain time period. They might leave, complain or find another place.

And for fine dining restaurants, we can’t go with overbooking because most places are where people celebrate special occasions. So, can’t give a certain time period for like these occasions. It’s not practical too.

· Tracking Prior Offenders

When customers racked up numerous no-shows, eventually the restaurant will no longer accept their reservations.

Believe it or not, any restaurant using OpenTable is doing the same. The reservation system notes when a diner does not show up for a reservation and will deactivate a user’s account if four no-shows are recorded within a 12-month period.

OpenTable’s entire system seeks to minimize the problem by sending users email confirmations, reminders about their reservations, and reminders to cancel future reservations should they no-show.

Deactivated OpenTable users can surely just start up a new fake account in the Wild West that is the Internet.

Conclusion: Tracking no-shows is somewhat ineffective but awesome.

Design Process

User Research

Qualitative Research

I have conducted 20+ user interviews and collected viable information from them regarding the table booking experience.

1. How do you find a table for dining?
2. Do you have any experience using a web/app for table booking?
3. Do you get any chance to book a table for the children?
4. What type of occasion you have booked a table for?
5. How do you handle no-shows?
6. What is your opinion, if there is an application for a table booking?
7. Do you like offers while booking a table?
8. Which platform are you familiar with?

Quantitative Research

I have asked people to record their responses through the online survey form and questionaries. Around 20 people participated in filling out the survey which made this research possible.

Competitive Analysis

Competitive analysis can help us learn the ins and outs of our competition works and identify potential opportunities where we can outperform them. It also enables us to stay at the top of industry trends and ensure our product consistently meets and exceeds industry standards.