PPL Electric Utilities

Goals

• Decrease call center call volume by empowering users with self-service utility management.

• Decrease overhead costs through the reduction in call center volume

Challenge

Pennsylvania (PA) and Rhode Island (RI) each had their own business rules different from each other and LKE. My task was to update the user experience to align with the business rules of each op-co for each app and marry the PA and RI branding with the LKE app design.

Rhode Island billing edge cases including states of the billing screen and payment workflows.

UX Solution

• Aligned 100+ screens across 20+ workflows for iOS and Android devices with LKE as much as possible, delineating for business rules and requirements.

• Adapted 7+ web experiences unique to each op-co for iOS and Android mobile apps.

• Omitted low-fidelity wireframes and moved straight into high-fidelity design by utilizing the robust design system – a time saving part of the process.

Original LKE outage reporting workflow. Designed by Kendall Kiernan.

PPL Rhode Island outage reporting workflow.

Design Solution

• Aligned with the PPL brand team on a visual direction that removed drop shadows, added strokes, and updated colors to align with the PPL parent brand. The rest of the app look and feel remained aligned with the LKE app to convey a cohesive one PPL experience.

• Modernized the design file and system. This process saved hours of time once we transitioned from the PA app to the RI app.

Price to Compare screens with PPL Pennsylvania branding applied.

High-level standard payment plan states: down payment due for enrollment, active enrollment, and payment plan completion.

OnTrack payment plan card states including active enrollment, active application, and overlapping active enrollment and application scenarios.

Next Steps

If we were able to test the launch of each mobile app, I would validate our solutions by:

• Measuring the time to value from first time app use to first time payment completion for new mobile app users

• Tracking the number of call center contacts a week before and a week after MVP launch

History

I was brought onto the PPL project as lead product designer because of my experience with the original LKE app. In 2021, I designed the usage experience during Phase 2 of the LKE mobile app development using the established design system and workflow paradigms. This included a usage graph, usage table, and several edge cases.

Goal

Introduce a usage experience to the mobile app that allows users to track up to 12 months of their data.

Solution

I designed an interactive graph that presented the first 6 months of data on the screen, then allowed users to tap and drag to see more usage data than the screen space allowed.

When aligning with the dev team, they communicated that functionality would be out-of-scope for the project budget and take more time to implement than was allocated for usage launch.

I simplified my design to meet the business goal of launching on time and on budget. My solution was a dropdown menu that allows users to switch between the current and past 6 months of data.

The usage experience with PPL Rhode Island branding applied.

After usage, I designed the paperless billing enrollment experience, supported the LKE team with small app updates, and mentored a junior designer on their work designing the cashless pay experience. I became well-versed in the world of LKE. I used this historical knowledge to design new experiences and guide the visual direction of the new PPL apps for Pennsylvania in 2024 and Rhode Island in 2025.