Evidence 01. Baseline usability test

Results from remote usability test of the existing application pages and flow on GOV.UK

The user was not sure about the difference between business and personal type of applications which was on the legalisation application form. “Type of customer – Business / Personal” does not work, needs to be more of a question about representing a business yes/no, or lose it altogether

Having to return to the start to proceed to payment causes confusion with users expecting clear CTAs and a sequential flow.
Users want to know how many steps they have
Users going down rabbit holes on other gov.uk pages e.g. checking universities are recognised
Real documents or copies – one user not clear about this. Can we carry this through to confirmation?
Links on the right hand side on main page are confusing, 2 duplicates of inline content links

The in-text link and lack of a ‘next step’ CTA on the document checker page causes confusion and breaks the flow of the process.
Users thought by clicking on the university links in the recognised body section would take them to the next step in the journey
Confusion about degree certificate vs educational certificate, one user looking for ‘university’. Can we group them by collapsed categories to make it easier?
HM Revenue and Customs does not have the ‘HMRC’ acronym. We need to review each one and ensure variants are there for findability

The users once they were guided towards the Help/guidance information felt that it was clear and useful and would consider printing the leaflet. But currently can't find it and/or click footer Help link
One user also found the guidance on the application form itself useful
Expect help options to be clearly visible and accessible. Some expect a clear FAQs section and a clear and obvious Help button. Generally users struggle to find useful guidance
Unclear how to find specific, relevant help topics
Obscurity of guidance leaflet

One user enters total price instead of number of documents in the box, perhaps from seeing the £ example. Make clearer
References to 'Barclaycard' branding is confusing, makes users think they can only pay using a Barclaycard
Design and placement – logos are not clearly separated and difficult to work out what to click, especially with all the competing logos from Barclaycard
Make sure 2 decimal points always, currently shows £35.5 instead of £35.50

Add a print button to the confirmation page;
Add more details to the payment confirmation page such as date and more details about the document paid for;
Ensure return address is really clear (not included on current form)
Make it clear whether copies or originals

Overall the some users experienced confusion during the process of trying to navigation through the legalisation process on the website. The process was felt to be confused and was not a clear step by step process. Although the users had clear calls to action on the main legislation page this was not followed through into directing their journey through the process. It was not clear how where to go once a recognised body had been selected, the only options the user had were to either, go back using the browser buttons, change the document or start again. One user went through the process three times.
The navigation through the process was not very step by step as the user had to navigate backwards to get to the payment using the browser back buttons.
The user was confused and found it difficult to navigate through the complete legalisation process

Unable to view the editable application form on Wordpad on a tablet / general tablet issues editing documents.
Having to complete the application from online and then print it off to sign it.
Confusion about why are there two versions of the form, editable and printable as you have to print them both out anyway
There was no returns address on the legalisation application form itself
The users had to enter their address twice and it was not clear why
Users were asked to enter ticks and circle options on the form which was very difficult to do when completing the form on the computer
Having to complete the application from online and then print it off to sign it.
The user was able to complete the process although did question why the payment was before the completion of the application form (b/c need payment ref to enter on the form)

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