Case study · City government

A benefits application residents finish online

A redesigned benefits application cut abandoned forms and calls to the contact centre.

A resident is helped at a public service counter
Client
City government
Industry
Public sector
Practices
Experience design, Product engineering
Duration
6 months
Context

A city government serving 1.4 million residents, with benefits handled by a contact centre of 90 staff.

Challenge

Applicants faced a 22-page PDF form, and most phoned the contact centre for help before they finished.

Approach

How the work ran

  1. WK 0–4
    Frame
    Read a month of contact-centre notes and interviewed 30 residents who had applied.
  2. WK 4–10
    Prove
    Tested a seven-step prototype with residents, including screen-reader users.
  3. WK 10–26
    Build
    Built the service, integrated it with the case system and launched it in two districts first.
  • .NET
  • GOV-style design system
  • Azure
  • Case-management API
Results

What changed

−35%
Calls to the contact centre
81%
Applications completed online
AA
WCAG 2.2 level

“Residents stopped phoning us to ask what the form meant.”

Service owner, city government
−35%contact-centre calls
Related work

More from this route

All case studies

Which of your services do people phone about?

We will read your contact-centre data and show you where to start.

Discuss a service redesignhello@speey.com