Service Design Signals: 4 letters in a day
Something strange in the Jobseekers Allowance service
Welcome to this new micro-blog series called Service Design Signals. I’m calling it signals because these are little opportunities to understand something about how services work, by thinking though some of the things in our every day life that seem odd, awkward or put additional burden on us. These things, that people in the industry sometimes call ‘friction’, can help us identify cracks, creaks or idiosyncrasies with how the service has been designed… and maybe think about solutions too.
Context:
I recently came off Jobseekers Allowance after starting a new job. The other morning I heard the post being delivered and saw 4 identical envelopes all addressed for me on the floor in the hallway. All of the envelopes had text on the front in capital letters which read “IMPORTANT INFORMATION — PLEASE READ”.
I quickly realised that they were all about Jobsekers allowance, I’m not sure which letter goes with which now but I have:
- A letter notifying me of a change in my Jobseeker’s Allowance (that it would not be paid from X date as I was in employment.
- A letter notifying me that my Jobseekers Allowance counts as taxable income with something called a Certificate of Pay and Taxable Benefit and Tax Deducted/Rewarded, I’m not sure what this is.
- A P45 Part 1A, Part 2 and Part 3.
How does this feel?
Getting 4 letters with capital letters on the front is unsettling. As you open them you can’t be sure if there’s been a mistake and if the letters are all the same, and when they’re not you’re wondering why all of the information wasn’t in one single letter. Generally it just feels a bit confusing and weird.
That weirdness is a service design signal. So what might be happening?
Break it down…
Lets use Sarah Drummond’s Full Stack Service Design model as a way to break this down.
1.The Service. This is made up of User Experience and Business Processes.
The above context describes the service, in terms of user experience. Unfortunately we don’t have a sense of business processes because as a user this isn’t something we have access to.
2. Infrastructure. This is made up of Systems and Technology, and Data.
Again, as a user we don’t have access to either of these things but we can maybe make some assumptions. In this day and age it’s fair to assume that these letters aren’t handwritten by someone sat in an office, but rather produced automatically by a computer system; that points to Systems and Technology as a potential factor. There might also be data held about me in different places which mean that each letter has to be created separately.
3. The Organisation. Probably the biggest section, this is made up of Governance, Finance, Procurement, Organisational Structure, Skills and Roles, Measurement, Incentives and Authority.
There’s a lot here so let’s look at what we know or can easily find out. All the letters are titled Jobcentre Plus which is run by DWP (the UK Department for Work and Pensions) but the content of some of the letters is about Tax, for which HMRC (HM Revenue and Customs) are responsible. This suggests that Organisational structure may play a part.
4. Intent. This is what an organisation wants to achieve and is made up of Business Models, Policy, Mission and Values and Ethics.
We are dealing with a government service so it’s likely that Policy plays a part here. A quick google shows that DWP is responsible for welfare, pensions and child maintenance policy. While HMRC describes it’s role as to “collect the money that pays for the UK’s public services”. So what we see with these letters is maybe a convergence of two policy areas, one that wants to tell me that I won’t receive any more money, and another that wants me to know that I might be taxed on the money I was given.
5. Culture. These are the conditions that affect how decisions are made.
As a user we can’t be sure of the culture that led to these decisions being made.
So overall we’ve learned that this service weirdness is probably caused by different departments using different systems, and a convergence point for different policies happening when someone leaves Jobseekers Allowance.
Why does any of this matter?
We’re looking for signals that help us to interrogate how the services that we come into contact with in our daily lives run. It helps us to understand more about how things fit together and to think about what we would like to improve.
Lets face it, in the grand scheme of things most people aren’t going to be too inconvenienced by 4 letters turning up on their doorstep. I say most people, but some might find this difficult; think about people in precarious situations, maybe experiencing mental health conditions, or those with learning disabilities, dyslexia or more. The number of letters could cause more worry for some groups of people and the disparate information could be confusing for others.
And, while 2 departments might be working together to deliver this outcome — which is good — there might still be efficiencies to be made in terms of cost (sending letters is presumably 4 times more expensive than sending 1) so we might think about ways of bringing this information together for the benefit of both users and government.
What do you think?
If you like this blog, or if you have any feedback, please drop me a comment. Similarly if you’ve spotted any other ‘Signals’ please let me know, and maybe we can work them through together. Thanks!
