Improved letters about benefits A case study

• leçon - matière potentielle : style
• leçon - matière potentielle : strategy
• fiche de synthèse - matière potentielle : level
• fiche de synthèse - matière potentielle : table
• exposé - matière potentielle : reasons
• expression écrite

The Department for Work & Pensions deal with most of the UK's social security benefits, and send out over 150 million letters a year. Their system-produced letters had become long and unwieldy, so they asked the Simplification Centre to join their project team tasked with designing a better format. The new format breaks up the content, showing its different status, and uses a layout that encourages strategic reading. It is written in plain English, and explains step-by-step how amounts are calculated.

• dwp
• line length
• team around halfway through the process
• letters about benefits
• panels
• document
• team
• content