Why is this important?

People expect services to just work, and government services should be no exception.

Making things more complicated than they need to be undermines trust in government e.g. requesting information multiple times for the same transaction, or not explaining what documents or information is required before starting the transaction

It costs government time and money to deal with mistakes that happen when services don’t work well .

Practical guidance for meeting this standard

Service teams should:

  • make sure the service helps the user to do the thing they need to do as simply as possible – so that people succeed first time, with the minimum of help
  • use the gov.am design system for visual components e.g. layouts, front end components, fields. Find out about the gov.am design system.
  • Use the gov.am style guide to give the service a clear name, accessible via an official URL e.g. servicename.ministry.gov.am
  • ensure that any supporting text content is clear, concise and written in accordance with the gov.am style guide recommendations for accessible web content.
  • test for usability frequently with actual and potential users, using appropriate research techniques․ Find out how to do user testing and research here.
  • test all the parts of the service that the user interacts with – online parts and offline parts (like letters or phone calls)
  • design the service to work online with a range of devices that users will be using e.g. mobile, computer