does my quote form have too many fields?

[unwashed potato!]

http://www.mayercleaning.co.uk/online-quote/?service=moving

just trying to see how i can improve my online quote system. one thing i've heard before is that people feel there's too many fields, however anything less will provide a less accurate quote, potentially causing issues with customers thinking we are the type of company that quotes low to get the work then raises prices on the day.

our largest form is linked above. wouldn't mind if anyone could go through it, it just page 1 of info needed that's not stored and then page 2 shows the rest of the form. page 3 is total so no need to progress past page 2.

i've considered removing the kitchen appliances, cleanliness level, and a few other fields.

any feedback is appreciated.

another option is to reduce the size of the pages and have more of them.

 

[unwashed potato!]

Thanks. They do change the price a small amount and helps not only get the price as correct as possible without viewing but also for us to correctly plan our day.

Our competition just has a very based for of 3 bed house, 2 bathrooms done. Then add on oven cleaning or carpet cleaning. Doesn't give an accurate price but certainly is much quicker and perhaps more appealing.

 

[unwashed potato!]

thanks. i like the idea of having the carpet cleaning section hidden by default. will look to having some jqeury collapsible thing

 

[unwashed potato!]

i prefer to keep the customer details page one as like you've said i can then contact after if they don't book with us. asking for the address also ensures we cover their area. no point giving a quote if it's for a property in scotland for instance.

although i don't mind those post code searches, the fact it costs, but only saves one field to me isn't worth it. at the moment i ask for 3 fields for the address, those post code searches usually ask for 2 and then you click to submit, then scroll down to find your property, so over all can take more time, esp considering many will have the address/phone etc saved in their browser so once they start putting in their name, the browser will auto fill the rest.

i can't really swap the dropdowns to radial/toggle buttons as how would that work for someone with say 5 bedrooms?

i do like the idea of swapping the radio buttons to nicer toggle buttons so will explore changing this.

 

[unwashed potato!]

gotcha. i like that idea. will see what it looks like. you're right it would be simpler to just click once rather than click the drop down then find the option then click that one

 

[unwashed potato!]

big update time! just done loads of small and medium updates to the form as well as the site in other areas. going through it all now, but would appreciate if anyone could take a second to have a look and see what they think now.

the biggest changes being the carpet section is hidden and requires the user to select it to then reveal those questions, as well as the checkbox are the fancy ones suggested on here.

what do you think?

i do need some advice how i'd get the dropdown accordian to activate the checkbox when selected. at the moment at the section that says "do you want to include removals" if you select the dropdown arrow, this reveals the removals fields, but doesn't select yes on the checkbox. click the checkbox will then activate the dropdown, but the dropdown wont check the checkbox.

any ideas? i'm sure it's a simple line of jquery i just aren't getting right.

 

[unwashed potato!]

thanks for your feedback.

Currently, the first page says "1 of 3" - and, for most, putting in that much data on the page would put them off if you ask me - especially if they assume they've got two more pages with the same amount of input required.

Additionally, your third step is literally just "this is the price, click book!" - which isn't really a step.

you're right. i've changed that now to be more clear.

Additionally, when you do click book it doesn't display a summary of the details they've entered so they can double check AND is actually an additional step where they get the option to enter additional details.

good idea. will add something soon.

The back button doesn't work, which is annoying for me at least,

annoys me too though not sure best way to solve this. I could use _GET instead of _POST. anything wrong with doing this?

and you currently collect the property type (house, bungalow etc) on the first and second page.

it used to only be on the second page. people were selecting house type, but only 1 floor, so added the option to the first page, and then the floors is auto selected to 2 if house, 1 if bungalow or flat etc, which i figured would help the user as the field is typically correct for them without any input. i kept is on the second page just in case a user didn't realise it on the first page as it's a little out of place there.

EDIT: Just had a proper read through the thread and noticed you want to keep emails for callbacks - like others have said if I was prompted with that I'd always give fake emails (like I've just done umpteen times for testing it) but I do appreciate you likely get legitimate ones.

this honestly happens so rarely. we had 2 today, which were the first fake emails we've had in ages. if anything we get fake phone numbers more often than fake emails, but it's so rare as i guess most customers when they want a quote, they don't mind giving their email/phone.

Why not simply compromise and only collect the email (along with the number of rooms etc) on the first page? That gives you enough info to get in touch with them but doesn't burden them will filling it an annoying amount of information on the first step.

i figured most people have auto fill forms with their browser as default now, so they only really click the first field then it auto fills the rest for them making it actually easier to have the full customer details within 1 page. no way to check this, but figured it was the case nowadays

Oh, also, it's not highlighted what fields are required. Another usability aspect I'd suggest you adopt is not having "house" selected by default, but have "Please select" or something similar so you can ensure that the user HAS selected a value rather than missed the option and left it on its default.

most fields are required other than the ones which say (optional). if the required fields aren't filled out then it will highlight which are still needed.

house is about 90% of what users select, so figured it makes sense to have this auto filled to house saving the user having to select this