Why I Care About Docs

I’ve been thinking about documentation a lot lately because of my experience of helping South Asian workers navigate Singpass (Singapore’s digital identity service).¹ Singpass interfaces and documentation support the 4 official languages – Malay, Chinese, Tamil and English – which makes navigating Singpass a challenging task for people who don’t speak any of these languages.

I started my own page of quick links to speed up my own process of connecting workers to the right e-service (for account registration, password resets) etc, but realised that I could probably make a bigger impact if I:

• Translate my existing quick links page into Bengali and other languages
• Convert existing Singpass documentation from PDF to machine-readable formats
• Add a mini experiential component to get users (Work Permit) holders to experience logging in with Singpass for themselves, as reading English instructions may not be the best way to understand how to log in. This was something that kind of emerged as my informal helpdesk sessions went on – I wanted to find an immediately useful example to show workers how logging in works, and landed on logging in to the SG Workpass app via Singpass as my example. Logging in with Singpass allows workers to see their Work Permit validity, and also access employment information such as their salary, which can be useful in the future for any salary claims.

Everyone’s got a different level of tech-savviness. It’s quite hard to pin down, but there are some things that become second nature when you’ve used enough devices – like knowing that clicking the bold colour button is usually the way to progress. Some guys can figure out how to navigate the registration interface fairly independently although it’s in English, as long as I provide them with the right link for registering an account (which has to be accessed with the browser rather than the Singpass app, since such account services are not available within it). The best illustration of this is, I think, is the video “What Games Are Like For Someone Who Doesn’t Play Games” by Razbuten.

If I can write good docs, make them machine-readable and responsive for mobile devices, and make them available in languages that others are familiar with, then perhaps people can get access to services like Singpass more quickly.

I’m deeply concerned about access to services like Singpass because they are not truly optional. They’re “optional” in a sense that you aren’t legally required to use it, but accessing services without it becomes much harder. Alternative means for access to services when you don’t have Singpass are not guaranteed. The Singapore Courts has the CJTS Pass which is an alternative for accessing digital services when you’re not eligible for Singpass, but the TADM eService for filing a salary claim is gated by Singpass. I’ll talk a bit more about the issue of alternatives means to transact in another post, when I have the time and energy to compile screenshots and archived web links.