When life gets more expensive, digital government has to get easier.
Australian government services are increasingly digital, and for many citizens that is working well. Overall usage is high, satisfaction is strong, and digital channels are now a normal part of everyday life. But those averages can hide the people most at risk of being left behind. Citizens under financial pressure are often highly digitally active, yet more likely to struggle with government services when they need support most.
This is the service design challenge public sector leaders now need to solve. The next phase of digital government is not simply about adding more online services. It is about designing services that work for people who are stressed, time-poor, mobile-first, and less confident that complex systems will work in their favour.
Cost-of-living pressure changes digital behaviour in important ways. Australians in precarious financial situations are more likely to say they struggle to find, use or understand online government services. Lower-income households are more likely to report difficulty navigating services than higher-income households. They are also more likely to rely on smartphones to access services, less likely to use desktop or laptop devices, and more likely to have concerns about data sharing, privacy and the use of AI. In other words, the problem is not a simple lack of digital access. It is an experience gap shaped by pressure, trust and context.
For service teams, that distinction matters. People under financial strain may be managing urgent needs, multiple services, unfamiliar eligibility rules and emotionally difficult life events all at once. In those moments, even a technically functional service can feel overwhelming. Long pages, dense instructions, fragmented agency boundaries, repeated form filling and ambiguous next steps all create friction that citizens may not have the time or headspace to absorb.
Designing for citizens under pressure starts with a different assumption: stress reduces capacity. That means services should be built to lower cognitive load at every step. Journeys should be short, plain-English and clearly structured around what the person is trying to do, not how government is organised. Users should be able to see quickly whether they are in the right place, what information they need, how long the process will take and what will happen next. Where possible, services should remember known information, reduce duplication and provide clear progress indicators so people do not feel lost.
Mobile-first design should also move from principle to discipline. Smartphones are the most common device for accessing government services overall, and they are even more strongly preferred by people in precarious financial situations. That means key tasks cannot be merely mobile-compatible. They need to be genuinely designed for small screens, unstable attention and on-the-go use. Forms should be broken into manageable steps. Content should be scannable. Authentication should be simple and secure. Uploading documents, saving progress and returning later should be straightforward. If a service is hard to complete on a phone, it is hard to complete for many of the people who may need it most.
Trust also has to be designed in, not explained after the fact. Citizens facing financial pressure are more cautious about how government uses data and more concerned about AI. Broader research shows that trust around privacy and data security has weakened, and support for AI in public services is clearly conditional on transparency, regulation and visible safeguards. For service teams, this means reassurance cannot sit in policy documents alone. It has to appear in the experience itself.
That includes simple explanations of why information is being requested, how it will be used, whether it will be shared across departments and what benefit the citizen will receive in return. It also means being explicit when AI is used, especially in support, triage or personalisation. Citizens are open to faster and more convenient services, but many still want a human involved when issues are sensitive, complex or high stakes. Services should therefore use AI carefully: to reduce friction, improve discovery and support staff, not to create a colder or less accountable experience.
The strongest public services will be omnichannel by design. Better digital government does not mean digital-only government. People under pressure often want the convenience of digital and the reassurance of human help. Research shows that many Australians still prefer speaking to someone directly during important life events, and they become discouraged when they cannot find what they need online or assume the process will be too hard. A good service should make channel switching feel seamless, not punitive.
That means clear handoffs to phone or in-person support, shared context so citizens do not have to start again, and assisted digital pathways for people who begin online but cannot complete the journey alone. It also means training frontline teams with the same service logic and information architecture used in digital channels, so support feels joined up rather than contradictory.
Communication design is another critical lever. Under financial stress, people are more likely to interpret government language as intimidating, confusing or risky. Messages that are legally accurate but emotionally cold can increase drop-off. Teams should use communications that are calm, direct and action-oriented. Reminders should help people understand what to do next. Notifications should reduce uncertainty, not amplify it. Eligibility language should be clear. Requests for evidence should feel proportionate. The tone of the service should signal support, not suspicion.
There is also a discoverability challenge. During major life events, many Australians do not start with government at all. They turn first to friends and family, search engines and increasingly generative AI tools. That means public sector teams need to think beyond the service portal itself. Information must be easy to find, easy to understand and structured in ways that work across search, support channels and machine-mediated experiences. As AI becomes part of how citizens seek answers, government content will need to be accurate, current and structured clearly enough to reduce the risk of confusion or misinformation.
For leaders, the implication is clear. If citizens under pressure are more likely to need support, more likely to be mobile-first and more likely to have trust concerns, then they should become a priority user group for service design. Not as an edge case, but as a forcing function for better government.
The practical playbook is straightforward: simplify journeys for high-stress moments, reduce information overload, design mobile-first from the start, build visible trust signals, offer seamless human support, and communicate with clarity and empathy. These are not marginal improvements. They are the foundations of inclusive digital government.
When government designs for citizens with the least time, the least certainty and the least room for error, services become better for everyone. That is how digital transformation moves from access alone to real public value.