Miriam L. Gerver > > I am doing a presentation at a conference this year on e-government > web forms, and would like to include examples of well-designed forms > from different countries. I have some examples, but could use a few > more.
Here are some examples that have some good design features. No doubt you'll be able to suggest design improvements to them - in my experience, the complexity and constraints of government make it really difficult to achieve designs that are perfect. Have a look at the Washington State case study presented by Anthro-tech. It's a .pdf available from their home page: http://www.anthro-tech.com/ Washington State has had a massive commitment to the 'Plain Talk' program for several years now, and has done a lot of user-centred design improvement to tough challenges like the language of its health and safety laws. In the UK, I've been impressed with the design of Money Claim Online. This allows you to sue someone for an amount less than £100,000 (approx US$ 170,000). https://www.moneyclaim.gov.uk/csmco2/index.jsp HM Revenue and Customs (our tax authorities) has a superbly easy-to-use form that allows an employer to tell the tax authority that no PAYE tax is due this quarter. (Translation: PAYE is our term for deducting two taxes, income tax and national insurance plus a few other possible things from employees' pay. A very small employer, typically a one-person business, might not be able to pay salary one quarter or pay at a low enough rate that no tax is due). This form may not look all that easy but all you need to complete it is a single reference number which any employer would easily be able to copy from the highly distinctive 'payslip booklet' as described on the form. This form is so simple it's even slightly disconcerting. http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/payinghmrc/paye-nil.htm I worked with the Financial Services Authority on the design of their Application Packs. These are highly complex forms that they use to assess whether an organisation or individual is 'fit and proper' to conduct various types of financial business in the UK. The minimum, non-returnable fee is £2000. The e-Government part of this process is the bit that allows an applicant to select the right forms for completing offline. For example: http://www.fsa.gov.uk/pages/Doing/How/application/index.shtml It's easier to come up with forms that offer huge scope for improvement. To give just one ironic example, the UK government has recently released an online forms tool that allows government departments to self-assess the difficulty of their paper forms. The fearsome preamble hints at the complexity to come: http://oii-web-005.oii.ox.ac.uk/escher/checklist/paper-form/ Best Caroline Jarrett www.formsthatwork.com ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [email protected] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
