Six Ways eGovernment Can Alienate Citizens

I recently heard a key figure in Ireland's eGovernment initiative comment that although eGovernment is one of the most important challenges facing the country today, you won't hear many people discuss it in a pub on Friday night. That might be the case now but if eGovernment services begin to fail Irish "eCitizens", it's a safe enough bet that along with other Government failures it may become a talking point.

So how could eGovernment alienate users?

Failing To Create And Build Trust

Trust is a key issue for eGovernment. On web sites, users look for contact details, secure transactions and whether or not the service provider is a well known brand name. Of course, "The government" is a well-known name, as are many of the public sector organisations that people interact with on a daily basis. However, when it comes to using their services through other portals - like Oasis and Basis in the Irish context, will people know and trust the names of these new portals?

In the context of the "life events" model - where the user finds information and services through a structure based on key moments in the life of the citizen, e.g. buying a house, as opposed to navigating through a mess of bureaucracy and red tape - this becomes a pressing issue.

Previously, the citizen was forced to learn the fit between various departments and organisations and by so doing, would inevitably pick up the names of the various bodies in government. Now that they don't have the same need to know this, the identities of Government agencies take a back seat - which means that something else is required to build trust. Will the eCitizen have to deal with a rash of new service names, brand identities and meaningless anagrams, designed to communicate the "new" service offerings?

Trust is also difficult to establish when the phone is used as an interface with service providers - a scenario that is likely to become increasingly common in eGovernment. There is less room for including privacy statements and other information to put users at ease. The look and feel of a web site can present a trustworthy appearance, but doing the same on a mobile device represents a real challenge.

Bad or Unusable Security

Security and trust go hand in hand when it comes to confidential information. No-one wants their income and tax details displayed for the world to see. Those who use mobile phones to interact with government may also perceive that because the phone is a wireless device, their data transfer may be less secure.

Simply providing people with PIN numbers is not the answer to security. In fact there are many usability problems with PIN numbers. 25% of Ireland's population is functionally illiterate. These people will struggle with complex pin numbers (and the most secure PIN numbers ARE complex). Those who can't use PIN numbers or the security features of online services will look for the more traditional alternatives - defeating many of the purposes of introducing online services in the first place.

Poor Fulfilment

Security and brands can go only so far; trust-building also requires that orders are fulfilled efficiently and with minimum hassle. Bad connections, unreliable sites, and confusing task flows all serve to alienate users. Users do not want to negotiate a lengthy registration process before discovering that they require information from elsewhere (such as a passport number, for example) to complete their transaction. Failing to explain everything that's required up front, or to have an infrastructure that processes user information correctly and in a reasonable time are key factors in alienating users.

Fulfilment is equally important for services delivered over the phone. If a user orders forms or information on an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) application, they may like to be told when to expect delivery. Otherwise, there is no tangible proof that their request is not sitting on an answering machine in an uninhabited office.

Inaccessible Services

EU policy, upcoming legislation, and the desire to avoid embarrassing incidents where marginalized, but highly vocal, groups are unable to use eGovernment services means that the Irish Government is putting a lot of effort into developing 'accessible' services.

Accessibility is an easy word to misinterpret. Making a service accessible does not begin and end with making websites available to blind people, or making kiosks wheelchair-friendly. Accessibility is all about making services equally easy for everybody to use.

Online services will need to be more than just accessible - in the generally used sense of the word. Interfaces will need to cater for people using older technologies, assistive technologies, late adopters as well as the more "expert users". Some of those people will have varying functional abilities, depending on their context of use. Interfaces and the task flows of online services will need to be very flexible to cope with the variety of requirements presented by these multiple user groups.

Reflecting Departmental Structures And Processes

The Oasis and Basis web sites are a first step in the right direction. Allowing people to navigate by "life events" as opposed to negotiating complex bureaucratic structures shows the government's commitment to moving towards a more customer-centric approach to delivering services and information.

However, this model of navigation requires further development. Repeat visitors may want to customise their information flow. For example, if everyone has a home page, they could personalise the content depending on their context. I could therefore get content with a focus on buying a house and related information if I was at that stage in my life. By setting up my profile in this way, I might receive timely information that I didn't even know was available to me. This not only makes eGovernment more relevant but it also adds value to the service.

Failing To Involve Users In The Design Of Services And Interfaces

This article has looked at some questions and issues surrounding the usability of eGovernment. The only way to find answers to many of these questions is, strangely enough, to put it in the hands of customers. However, focus groups and highly informal "getting users to look at the interface" type testing, while better than none at all, is neither reliable or effective.

User requirements gathering and user testing with an audience made of user groups as diverse as the population in it's entirety must be carried out in a structured way if it is to yield anything other than a confusing tangle of conflicting requirements and wish lists which will quickly squander tax payer's money.