FuelCheck — Damian Martelli

The brief

FuelCheck is the NSW Government’s service for live fuel prices at stations across NSW and the ACT. The government came to us looking for proposals to improve the app.

Our agency’s research found it fell short in a few areas:

Confusing navigation
Trip planning that was hard to understand and set up
Fewer features and a more confusing experience than competing apps

My role

I wasn’t part of the research. Our agency’s researchers brought me their findings, and I proposed solutions and designed the user experience and interface for them.

Approach

The redesigned app: nearby prices on the map, a station’s details, and a planned trip.

Cheap fuel, before you go looking

The home screen proactively tells drivers where their closest, cheapest fuel is, along with price trends and alerts through the week.

Clearer prices nearby

Colour highlights which stations are cheap and which are expensive at a glance, and nearby stations cluster together when you zoom out, so the map stays readable.

Recommendations that count the cost of getting there

A cheaper station isn’t a saving if it costs more to drive there. Recommendations around the driver weigh each station’s distance, and the cost of getting there, against the saving on fuel.

A station’s details next to the map, with prices by fuel type and its rank among the cheapest nearby.

Proper trip planning

Drivers can add multiple stops and plan a full route, which helps on longer drives like holidays and road trips, and save the addresses they use often.

Planning a trip across Sydney, with the best-value stations along the route.

Alongside the new features, I proposed a modern redesign of the app as a whole.

The redesign on desktop.

Outcome

The proposals were presented to the NSW Government and received positive feedback. The government has used them to apply for funding to build some of these features.