Renewal at 70 and Exchange Paper to Photocard
Source: gov.uk (2025-08-05)

Service standard report for DVLA's Renewal at 70 and Exchange Paper to Photocard alpha assessment

Service standard report

Renewal at 70 and Exchange Paper to Photocard

Service description

In 2006 DVLA first introduced a digital service for driving licences. At the time this was seen as a major milestone and step towards digital. The service was built to mirror the Direct.Gov look and feel. Over the years the services have proved very successful and have seen usage increase to the point where over 70% of all drivers’ transactions are now done online.

However, due to the aging technology behind these services, DVLA wasn’t able to make any significant changes to the customer journey for many years. Some journeys have therefore become outdated and no longer meet modern standards for usability or accessibility.

This alpha assessment focuses on the Renewal at 70 and Exchange Paper to Photocard user journeys.

Service users

This service is for:
- customers that want to renew their driving entitlement at the age of 70 and every three years afterwards.
- customers that want to exchange their paper based driving licenses to photocard licenses.
Things the service team has done well:
- the team is employing a range of methodologies to understand users, including reviewing existing evidence such as customer satisfaction surveys and forum comments. The team has conducted multiple rounds of research and included a good representation of users with a wide range of access needs.
- the team had clearly thought the service through well in a complex transformation environment, understanding the scope and inter-relationships between various services.
- the new user journeys are built on a strategic DVLA platform that has been assessed previously. The team reuses existing platform components and works closely with component owners, such as identity and caseworker subsystems, to implement changes in line with agreed standards.
1. Understand users and their needs

Decision

The service was rated green for point 1 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-1-understand-user-needs).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- the panel did not see strong evidence that the team had identified their riskiest assumptions to test in alpha (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/agile-delivery/how-the-alpha-phase-works#focus-on-testing-your-riskiest-assumptions). We recommend the team to identify their riskiest assumptions and to go into future research sessions with clear assumptions and hypotheses to test.
- while the team has conducted research with some users with medical conditions, the panel did not see the specific needs and pain points of this user group. The personas presented depicted the needs of different users but seemed to be largely defined around digital confidence. The team is encouraged to consider the specific needs of users with medical conditions and a way to articulate and share those needs with the team.
- more broadly, the team is encouraged to think about all the different types of users who will need to use the two services and consider whether there are likely to be pain points for particular groups of users when accessing the service and completing their transactions that should be prioritised for research.
2. Solve a whole problem for users

Decision

The service was rated green for point 2 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-2-solve-a-whole-problem).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- several parts of the end-to-end journey of the two services are being built and tested by different teams. The panel notes that the team is working with those other teams and sharing best practice. We would encourage the team to go further and actively work with the user researchers on the other teams to define research roadmaps together and regularly share research insights with each other to ensure that pain points identified in any part of the journey by any team can be acted upon by other teams, and to ensure ownership of all research insights by all teams.
3. Provide a joined-up experience across all channels

Decision

The service was rated green for point 3 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-3-join-up-across-channels).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- consider ways to couple the offline part of the service with the digital part. It seems it’s being considered properly but separately, including reviewing the D46 form in light of any research insights on the online channel. Likewise, greater consideration of how people may switch channels mid-journey would make the service better.
- ensure the non-happy paths for users who may start the online services but not be able to complete them are tested and guidance iterated accordingly.
4. Make the service simple to use

Decision

The service was rated green for point 4 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-4-make-the-service-simple-to-use).

5. Make sure everyone can use the service

Decision

The service was rated green for point 5 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-5-make-sure-everyone-can-use-the-service).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- the team is encouraged to prioritise research with users with low digital confidence, and users using a mobile or tablet device to access the service. The panel notes that the team has included this in their future research plans. Given initial evidence the team gathered that tablets are the preferred device of choice for some of the users, consider how to recruit specifically for users using a tablet device.
6. Have a multidisciplinary team

Decision

The service was rated green for point 6 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-6-have-a-multidisciplinary-team).

7. Use agile ways of working

Decision

The service was rated green for point 7 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-7-use-agile-ways-of-working).

8. Iterate and improve frequently

Decision

The service was rated green for point 8 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-8-iterate-and-improve-frequently).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- work more on incorporating end-user value into development prioritisation decisions.
9. Create a secure service which protects users’ privacy

Decision

The service was rated green for point 9 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-9-create-a-secure-service).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- as the core platform undergoes regular IT Health Checks, teams need to understand the expectations for addressing the issues highlighted in the report.
- to manage medical declarations, improvements were made to role-based access within the caseworker subsystem, and audit capabilities were enhanced. The team needs to ensure the sensitive data is stored and managed correctly, and that the Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) reflects changes to the caseworker system.
10. Define what success looks like and publish performance data

Decision

The service was rated green for point 10 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-10-define-success-publish-performance-data).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- work with the finance team to better understand cost per transaction figures to more accurately calculate running costs and the difference between online and offline channels.
11. Choose the right tools and technology

Decision

The service was rated green or point 11 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-11-choose-the-right-tools-and-technology).

12. Make new source code open

Decision

The service was rated green for point 12 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-12-make-new-source-code-open).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- the team publishes some of their code in public repositories. It could be worth exploring whether making their code openly accessible by default, and restricting access in case of a security risk, would be effective.
13. Use and contribute to open standards, common components and patterns

Decision

The service was rated green for point 13 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-13-use-common-standards-components-patterns).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- the core platform uses a standard format, like OpenAPI, and integrates shared government services including OneLogin, GOV.UK Pay, and GOV.UK Notify. Exploring the options available for the team to contribute to the OpenAPI community and suggest improvements to government shared services could be insightful.
14. Operate a reliable service

Decision

The service was rated green or point 14 of the Standard (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-standard/point-14-operate-a-reliable-service).

Optional advice to help the service team continually improve the service:
- collaborating with digital component owners and the owners of other user journeys to improve test coverage and reduce the time required to implement changes.
- considering the number of dedicated teams managing various digital components of the strategic platform, it is essential to understand the team’s responsibilities in the event of a business continuity and disaster recovery scenario or during component failure.
Next Steps

This service can now move into a private beta (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/agile-delivery/how-the-beta-phase-works) phase, subject to getting approval from the GDS spend control team. The service must meet the standard at beta assessment before launching public beta.

To get the service ready to launch on (http://gov.uk/)GOV.UK (http://gov.uk/) the team needs to:
- get a GOV.UK service domain name (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/technology/get-a-domain-name)
- work with the GOV.UK content team (https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/service-assessments/get-your-service-on-govuk) on any changes required to GOV.UK (http://gov.uk/) content