European Union law states that refund must be given in case of delay of more than 60 minutes (European Union, 2009). NS has extended this law by also giving refunds in case of a delay between 30 and 59 minutes. Different tariffs have been established for the different types of tickets NS is offering.
Approximately 650.000 claims are being filed each year, with a total value of 6,5 million euros (Treinreiziger.nl, 2011). There are two ways of filing a claim with NS in the current situation: via a paper form, which can be ordered on the website, by telephone or taken at a local NS balie, or via Mijn NS, for which an account must be created and an OV-chipkaart must be connected. Currently, the online version of this service is therefore only accessible at the highest authentication level. The brainstorm resulted in the conclusion that people should also be able to access this service while not or partially authenticated, in order to improve the accessibility of the service.
For filing a claim in case of a delay, only little data about the customer needs to be known. A card number needs to be entered, together with the details about the journey at which the delay was experienced, in order to validate the truthfulness of the claim. The customer’s name and email address are needed to be able to have a way of contacting the customer. If the customer has connected his/her card to an account, the refund can also be paid out by a bank transaction and for this, a bank account number is needed. If this is not the case, the money can be refunded by increasing the balance on the OV-chipkaart with which the travel was made.
7.2.1 FRAUD ASPECTS
When the authentication barrier is lowered, an increase in fraud using claims is possible. Measures should be taken to keep the risk of fraud low. Claims for an OV-chipkaart which are not fully authenticated will be paid out as a
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balance increase on the chipkaart. This makes sure the customer needs to possess the card in order to receive the refund and reduces the chance at fraud.
With paper tickets, fraud could happen when people fill in other people’s card numbers and travel data with their own bank account number. Via the web form, they do not need to send the physical card via mail anymore. However, in the current situation fraud is also possible when paper cards are stolen from other people. Also, as a fraud detection method, NS can check if people try to claim multiple times on a single timeframe.
7.2.2 FINANCIAL ASPECTS
There could be an increase of costs at the side of NS because more people will file a claim because of delay. However, claims filed via the online channel are easier to process and therefore the process costs will decrease. Also, the lowering of the authentication barrier will probably lead to higher customer satisfaction, which possibly has positive effects on sales figures. A balance has to be found between customer friendliness and cost- effectiveness. Experts will be consulted about this subject, to determine if the redesign finds that right balance.
7.2.3 SERVICE AT DIFFERENT AUTHENTICATION LEVELS
The redesigned services is filled in differently at the three defined authentication levels. Figure 25 shows which three variants of the service can be used by customers.
Figure 25 – Variants of refund in case of delay service for authentication levels
When a customer is not logged in, a web form can be filled in in which the minimal information is entered. A link is sent to the customer’s email with the claim number, so that the customer in the future can inquire about the status of the claim.
When a customer is logged in but has not connected an OV-chipkaart, the service is essentially the same as for customers who are not logged in. NS remembers the personal details of the customer so that he/she does not need to fill those in each time a claim needs to be filed. Also, previous claims can be viewed, together with their current status: whether they are approved or disapproved.
When a customer has connected an OV-chipkaart, a claim in case of delay can be filed through the travel history overview, just like the service currently works at Mijn NS. This is already a very fluent and effort-efficient way of filing a claim: in under a minute, a claim can be filed. Optionally, an email can be sent to the customer if he/she has probably had a delay or refund can be pro-actively paid out when there is enough certainty that the customer had a delay. This is currently already happening with NS International.
7.2.4 OTHER FUNCTIONALITY
It will be possible to not only file claims for an OV-chipkaart, but also for other travel tickets, like a paper chip-card or an e-ticket. This will be possible in all situations, whether an OV-chipkaart has been connected to an account or not.
Also, this service will be available on smartphones via an application, for even quicker claim filing when and where the customer wants to. The service is the same as the computer version, so that consistency is guaranteed.
0. Web form: no
pre-filled data
1. Pre-filled web
form, claim
history visible
2. Quick claiming
via travel history,
pro-active
notifications
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Currently, customers have to wait until 48 hours after they have completed their journey. This increases their effort, because they cannot file their claim at the moment when it is relevant, namely during or just after their journey. Therefore, it will be possible to file claims earlier than 48 hours after the journey and even when the journey is not finished yet. NS will temporarily save the claim until the transactional data are available, and then process the claim. When a customer has created an account, he will be able to connect previous claims to his account from the time that the account was not created. This happens by sending an authorization link via email to the address that the claim was filed on.