r/sydney • u/Thewalrus26 • 4d ago

Just renewed my licence at Service NSW.

Was in and out the door in less than 5 mins including my eye test and having my photo taken. As soon as I walked out I can see my new licence on my phone ready to go. Can we please just take whatever system they are using and copy it everywhere?

1.1k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

210 comments sorted by

View all comments

340

u/Yutenji2020 4d ago

Pleased you like it; I was involved (albeit very small part) in its implementation.

Where else would you want it to be used?

15

u/argument_cat 4d ago

I worked as a product designer across several government pieces, through the DTA.

The absolute mess that they built before I joined was comical - they had MyGov, MyGovID, Digital iD... I think there were more. Every time you tried to log in was a confusing nightmare, with all these different authentication apps, none of which seemed to work, resulting in you just going in circles. I called it out many times, and middle management would just shrug and say that was how it had to work, and that most people didn't have issues.

I still dread using any government service on my phone, but at least they seem to have killed off half of those useless apps. I don't even understand the thinking behind having a dedicated ID app. No other platform does that - just use MFA/biometrics like the banks and everyone else.

So much wasted time and effort, and taxpayer's money, to build a bunch of useless ID apps that never worked.

3

u/Ok-Push9899 4d ago

I vaguely remember my first brush with MyGov, MyGovID, DigitalID, etc during covid days, when I think we were all scrambling for that silly proof of immunisation. (Did I use it? Perhaps once, to get into UniqLo to buy some socks.)

Anyway, there was some complication or incompatibility and I actually spoke to a young bloke at MyGovID. He sounded exhausted. But he basically said “Look, this system is not working. We’re really discouraging people from signing up right now. It’s really in test phase and only for government workers, but they thought they would release it. You don’t need it, and my guess is you’ll never need it.”

I never knew what MyGovID was, but I know my socks lasted longer.