Life Checks - Online help tool
Client
Life Checks (Australian Government initiative)
My role
UX / UI and visual designer
Deliverables
Interaction design, UI, illustration direction, prototype
Platform
Mobile-first responsive web app
Overview
Life Checks is a free online tool that asks a handful of simple questions about your finances, health, work and relationships, then gives you a short, practical list of things worth doing at your stage of life. It is aimed at people in their 40s to 60s who are not planning for later life because it feels too far away or too overwhelming.
I designed the tool from first sketches to a polished, accessible UI, including the visual language that made it feel approachable rather than bureaucratic.
The challenge
- Retirement planning content is usually dense, text-heavy and aimed at people who are already engaged.
- The tool had to give useful, personalised results without collecting sensitive personal data or requiring an account.
- Most traffic would arrive from social media on a phone, with seconds to convince people to start.
- Results had to link to dozens of government and community services without becoming a link farm.
Design
Question design
Reduced a 40-question policy survey to 12 conversational questions that still produced meaningful results.
Interaction model
One question per screen, big tap targets, progress shown as a simple path, and the ability to skip anything.
Results page
A prioritised "your next three things" list first, with the full set of suggestions below, each with a single clear action.
Visual language
Warm palette, rounded components and simple illustrations to make the topic feel manageable.
Visual design
The look needed to sit alongside government branding without inheriting its formality. I chose a warm, high-contrast palette, generous rounded shapes and a friendly sans-serif, and directed a set of simple line illustrations for each life area. Every colour pairing was tested for WCAG 2.1 AA contrast, and every interaction works with keyboard and screen readers.
Prototype and testing
A clickable prototype was tested with people in the target age range, recruited from outside the usual "engaged planner" group. The biggest change from testing was moving the "why we ask" explanation from a separate page into a tap-to-reveal note on each question, which lifted completion in the second round.
Outcome
Life Checks launched with a national campaign and became one of the most-completed interactive tools on the government's site. The question and results patterns have since been reused for other self-assessment tools.