Briefcase
Liberating legal services for all.
Context
Only 8 percent of low income workers file claims when they are seriously injured.
25 percent of those who do file face first-round denial.
At the end, only 6 percent of claimants receive benefits.
The majority of the people affected are immigrants and people who speak English as a second language since they often either cannot afford a lawyer or cannot find someone who speaks the same langauge as them. I thought to myself that there must be lawyer-finding apps and websites out there already that are attempting to solve this problem so I went and did some research.
Research
What I found was that existing apps that try to connect people with lawyers are extremely inefficient due to the poor interface design. The screens are cluttered, the questions they ask are unnecessary and complex, there is no multi-language support, and it takes way too much time to complete the forms.
User Interface of LegalMatch
And so I decided to make my own design for an app that would help people get connected to lawyers and be easy to use and accessible for people who speak other languages.
The Designs
The first question asks the user what language they would like to continue in so that the user is comfortable and is able to understand the questions they will be asked.
After the user chooses a language, the entire app will be translated into that language and so all the questions will also be asked in that language.
As you can see, it is designed so that the user is asked one simple question at a time so that the user is not confused and the screen is not cluttered. There are also shades of color to make the text more readable.
After the user answers all the questions, they will be shown lawyers that speak the same language as them in ascending order in terms of proximity. They can then select a lawyer and look at their profile which has information about them such as their contact information.
Readability and comprehensiveness was prioritized when designing the interface for these screens. Therefore, only essential information is displayed.
Conclusion
I was able to successfully create an app design that is accessible to people who speak languages other than English. This app design also readable and comprehensive so that the user is not bogged-down with complex words or a cluttered screen. I added shades of color to really differentiate the various choices. If I were to continue this project further, I would add a user profile page where the user could add information that relates to themself and their case. The most important lesson I learned from doing this project was that something as simple as the language of an interface makes an immense amount of difference to the user so I will keep that in mind when designing future interfaces.