Citizens abandoned applications at 68% and a consultancy industry existed purely to complete them. The form implemented the regulation's structure rather than the applicant's situation.
STUDY 28 / 30 · ANONYMISED · NDA · DEFENCE & GOVTECH · NETHERLANDS · MUNICIPAL
DEFENCE & GOVTECH · NETHERLANDS A permit application a citizen can finish without a consultant.
RoleLead designer + researcher
Timeline15 weeks
Team2 designers, 1 researcher, 1 PM, 2 frontend, 1 policy SME
VerticalMunicipal permitting platform · building & environment
Led with an eligibility pre-check that tells people early whether they need a permit at all, then asked only the questions their specific case required.
Completion rose sharply and caseworker rework fell, because applications arrived complete and the applicants who did not need a permit never filed one.
79%APPLICATION COMPLETIONfrom 32%
18%APPLICATIONS NEEDING REWORKfrom 61%
24%APPLICANTS TOLD 'NO PERMIT NEEDED'before filing
THE ARGUMENT
Why the obvious solution was wrong.
The study matters because the product problem was reframed before the interface was polished.
The form asked every question the regulation contained because the regulation was the design input. An applicant replacing a window was asked about structural loading, protected views and environmental impact, none of which applied. Faced with sixty irrelevant questions and no way to tell which mattered, people either abandoned or hired someone who had learned which fields could be left empty - which is a consultancy industry created entirely by an interface.
The pre-check asks four questions and tells nearly a quarter of applicants that they need no permit at all, which is a public good and a caseload reduction simultaneously. Those who do need one see only the questions their case requires, with the branching derived from the regulation rather than exposed as it. Where an objection period applies, the interface states plainly who may object, on what grounds and by when - previously the single largest source of caseworker phone calls. Rework fell from 61% to 18%.
THE INTERFACE CRAFT
The interaction, rendered as a working product surface.
The specimen below is code-native and uses the study's own design logic. The client interface remains protected.
DEFENCE & GOVTECH
DEGRADED MODE
3 sources delayed
DESIGN DECISIONS
Positions we would defend.
Each decision names the principle and the product consequence, not a stylistic preference.
The regulation is an input, not a structure
Implementing a regulation's shape as a form's shape is the default failure of every government service we have studied.
Tell people they do not need you
Turning away a quarter of applicants is a public good and the single largest caseload reduction available.
Anxiety generates calls
Unexplained objection periods produced more contact than any other part of the process. Explaining them was a capacity intervention.
PRODUCT LEADER READOUT
What transfers, and what should remain specific to this product.
A case study is useful when its operating principle travels without turning the original interface into a template.
Read the operating condition
For Municipal permitting platform · building & environment, the transferable lesson is not a copied screen. It is the condition the interface had to make legible: Four questions establish whether a permit is required at all. Nearly a quarter of applicants are told they need none and stop. Rebuild that visibility for your own roles, risk, terminology, and operating cadence.
Protect the design rule
Implementing a regulation's shape as a form's shape is the default failure of every government service we have studied. Keep that rule in the acceptance criteria, component states, and production QA record so later visual cleanup cannot erase why the interaction exists.
Measure behaviour after ship
The evidence record is 79% for application completion, from 32%. Recreate the baseline and outcome window before rollout, segment the result by role and context, and state clearly what the measure cannot prove.
RESEARCH RECORD
The work behind the interface.
These artefacts connect the final interaction back to the evidence and product model that produced it.
Abandonment session study
Watched 40 citizens attempt the old application; median abandonment at question 19, always at an irrelevant section.
Consultant interviews
Interviewed six permitting consultants about what value they actually added; most of it was knowing which fields to skip.
Branching model
Derived the applicable-question logic from the regulation with the policy SME across 22 permit types.
Caseworker call coding
Coded 600 inbound calls; 34% concerned objection periods and 22% concerned whether a permit was needed at all.
“A quarter of the people applying did not need to be applying. Telling them that was the biggest thing we did.”
Head of Digital Services, Dutch municipality · under NDA
NEXT STUDY · 29 / 30 · PROCUREMENT