2.1 Usability: what we found
Website usability is ‘... an essential indicator of user-friendliness of a website which can be evaluated by observing users when using the website’s features and user interfaces. Good usability design focuses on user-centric design, which focuses primarily on users’ experience rather than the actual procedure’ (Ramotion, 2024).
Website usability involves the design of websites so that they are simple enough for people to achieve their tasks quickly and easily (Singhuja and Surajith, 2009). It includes being able to find your way around a website to locate the information you need and know what to do next with minimal effort (Nah and Davis, 2002). As users of websites tend to have a specific goal or aim in mind, the usability of websites is important. People may leave a website if they struggle to obtain the information required even if the website contains the information needed (McKinney et al., 2002).
Eleven academics and members of the research team (including a member of the public with lived experience of raising a concern) evaluated the usability of the websites. They approached regulator websites as a member of the public who wanted to raise a concern to the point of submitting a concern (but not submitting it). We asked our usability testers to explain their experiences with this process.
Activity: the usability of websites when raising a concern
Watch the following animation about how usable the regulator websites were based on our participants’ experiences. Make some notes in the text box below about what you might like if you were trying to raise a concern. Your notes will only be visible to you.
Transcript
SPEAKER 1: The usability of health and social care regulators websites is one of the first hurdles people face when raising a concern. For this reason, a team of researchers led by The Open University conducted research into people’s experiences navigating the sites to raise a concern about a professional. So let’s get a sense of people’s experiences, firstly, with finding information on the websites.
SPEAKER 2: First of all, with the main tab, it uses the term Fitness to Practise, which is just difficult to understand. It would be better to use the word concern or complaint. On the plus side, I did find the jargon busters and glossaries useful. The site should always include them.
SPEAKER 3: It would be good to have a navigation panel on the side showing where we’re up to and what’s available. The pages should be short and simple and in a logical order.
SPEAKER 4: It’s best when the links open in a new tab. Otherwise, I get worried I’m going to lose the original page. In general, there shouldn’t be too many links as all the information and places to go can be really overwhelming.
SPEAKER 1: OK, let’s take a closer look at the reporting process. First of all, what are people’s experiences of finding the form?
SPEAKER 2: If you’re going to have a concerns landing page, you should have a link to the form right there. So we don’t have to click through several pages of screening questions to get to it.
SPEAKER 4: Screening questions can be useful to make sure our concerns are raised with the right organisation. But they can be obstructive if we already know we’re in the right place.
SPEAKER 3: There should be multiple ways to raise a concern, email, downloadable document, telephone and online, and there should be the option to raise a concern anonymously. Only a few sites allow this.
SPEAKER 2: We should be able to see a list of what information we will need to have to hand before starting the form and to get a sense of how long it might take.
SPEAKER 4: It would also be helpful to have simple information about what will happen once a concern is raised, so we know what to expect.
SPEAKER 1: Finally, what were people’s experiences using the form itself?
SPEAKER 2: Mandatory fields on the reporting forms are actually quite obstructive. We might not have information like the registrant’s name or the registration number to hand.
SPEAKER 3: It’s helpful to have prompts saying what type of information we should put in each box and to be able to upload documents to avoid having to retell unpleasant stories and also to provide evidence like medical records.
SPEAKER 4: Forms should be short and simple with a progress bar so we know how far through we are. It’s better not to have word limits on our answers, so we can provide as much detail as we need to. It would be good if we could save our progress too, so we can take breaks.
Discussion
You will have seen from the animation that although there was some agreement between participants, there were some differences in opinion and only two websites scored highly enough to be ‘usable’. Some people liked screening questions to help direct them to the right place to raise a concern whereas others did not. This suggests that individual needs and preferences vary and even people who are confident with complex information found some of the websites and forms difficult to work with.