SCOPE:
SERVICE DESIGN, RESEARCH, UI/UX
COMPANY:
LWCC
YEAR:
2024
ROLE:
PROJECT LEAD, LEAD DESIGNER
Audit Journey Redesign
Context.
In 2024, LWCC conducted more than 16,500 audits as part of its standard workers’ compensation insurance process. After billing, audits are the company’s most frequent interaction with policyholders. Since every policyholder encounters an audit at some point, the process plays a significant role in shaping their overall experience with LWCC. A workers’ compensation audit is a retroactive review that looks back at a company’s completed jobs and actual risk exposure, then compares it against the initial estimates made at the start of the policy period. This ensures that policyholders are paying accurately for their coverage, and are neither overpaying nor underpaying, based on the realities of their business activities and associated risk.
Outcome.
The project led to three prioritized concepts that advanced into implementation. Each was tested through prototypes, which demonstrated promising impact: a 36% reduction in audit processing time, a 29% decrease in customer service calls related to audits, and a 78% increase in user satisfaction with the audit experience.
Challenge.
Today, however, the audit process is complex, overwhelming, and often confusing—particularly for small businesses without dedicated financial expertise. Unique to workers’ compensation and disconnected from other aspects of business operations, the process relies on dense insurance terminology and industry-specific steps and requirements that are not intuitive for most policyholders. As a result, there is limited understanding of what an audit entails, what is expected from policyholders, and why it is even required. This lack of clarity adds unnecessary burden to an already complicated and time-consuming process. We set out to better understand this journey from the policyholder’s perspective and explore opportunities to make the process simpler, clearer, and easier to navigate.
Methods.
Journey Mapping, Service Blueprinting, Research Interviews, Focus Groups, User Personas, Prioritization, Prototyping, and Testing
Service Blueprinting.
The process began with internal interviews to understand the audit workflow. Insights from these conversations were synthesized into a service blueprint, mapping the audit process as it exists today.
Research Interviews.
Recruitment was challenging due to the specialized audience we wanted to reach (business owners, ideally with LWCC policies), who could speak directly to our systems and processes. After testing multiple recruitment strategies, we successfully conducted 12 in-depth interviews. While the sample size was small, the insights proved highly valuable. They allowed us to quickly ideate, prototype, and test solutions with a broader audience later on. Because this was an early stage of solutioning, we embraced iteration and learning as part of the process, which gave us confidence to move forward even with a relatively small sample size.
Our 90-minute interviews were designed to capture a wide spectrum of perspectives across different policyholder profiles:
Size of business — large companies with finance teams vs. small businesses where owners managed audits themselves.
Workforce type — contract-heavy businesses (with more complex audits) vs. those with stable payrolls.
Record-keeping practices — highly organized vs. less structured documentation.
Audit history — those who had disputed audits vs. those who had not.
This diversity helped us see the audit journey from multiple angles and surface distinct needs across the spectrum.
Each conversation began by grounding in the context of daily business operations, to better understand owners’ mental models and priorities. We then moved into the audit process itself, exploring thoughts, feelings, and actions from the moment they received a notice to the time the audit was closed. Finally, we conducted a walkthrough of key artifacts—the audit notice letter, the online audit portal, and the audit summary letter—to gain feedback and identify gaps between LWCC’s intent and policyholders’ interpretation.
Analysis.
The team began by externalizing our research, gathering key quotes, data points, and observations into a shared space. From there, we clustered findings into themes, which revealed patterns across policyholder experiences. These themes were then distilled into insights that framed the problem and guided our ideation process.
By mapping the full journey, and through our research conversations, we identified three distinct stages of the audit process. Viewing the process through this lens clarified the goals of each stage and highlighted the types of support policyholders need along the way.
Insights.
Key insights from research were as follows:
Ideation.
Through a co-design workshop with auditors, who had been closely involved throughout our research, we facilitated a series of free-flowing brainstorms to generate a wide range of ideas. The group then refined and built upon the strongest concepts, which were taken to leadership for evaluation using an impact vs. effort matrix. From this process, three prioritized concepts were selected for further exploration and development.
Concepts.
1. Audit Readiness Check: Helping Policyholders Get Ahead
The Audit Readiness Check is a short, plain-language survey sent to policyholders 30 days before their audit begins. Based on their responses, policyholders receive a personalized checklist of required documents, giving them clear guidance on what is required and to be expected, helping them prepare with confidence.
This tool:
Removes the guesswork around which documents are relevant.
Provides extra preparation time before the audit officially starts.
Reduces stress by making the process more predictable and transparent.
Speeds up the audit once it begins, since documents are ready in advance and questions can be resolved early.
2. Online Audit+ : An Audit Experience that fits how Businesses Work
The redesigned Online Audit portal offers a step-by-step, user-friendly experience tailored to the needs of small businesses. Its goal is to make audits simple, supportive, and confidence-building, even for policyholders without finance teams or workers’ comp expertise.
Key features include:
Clear, plain language throughout, with simplified questions and narrative-led sections for easier understanding.
Smart guidance with optional tooltips that explain terminology, provide rationale for requests, and reduce frustration.
Pre-filled information from previous audits, allowing users to verify rather than re-enter data from scratch.
Practical examples to show the level of detail required for responses.
Adaptive pathways that adjust based on user input, asking only what is essential and streamlining the journey.
Overall, Online Audit+ reframes the audit portal as a supportive tool rather than a barrier, helping policyholders complete the process smoothly, with less stress and greater confidence.
3. Redesigned Audit Summary: Clear Answers to What Changed and Why
The Redesigned Audit Summary gives policyholders a transparent, easy-to-read explanation of their audit results, showing how their final premium was calculated, what changed, and what steps they can take next. Built in plain English, the summary reduces confusion, empowers business owners, and helps minimize unnecessary service calls.
Key Features
Instant Clarity on Results: A prominent green results box immediately answers the policyholder’s top question: “Do I owe more, less, or nothing?”
Quick Policy Snapshot: Key information such as policy number, policy period, and agent contact details are presented upfront to ground the reader.
Segmented, Visual Layout: Four clearly labeled sections with icons improve readability:
Results (outcome in green, most prominent)
Next Steps (actions the policyholder should take, if any)
Findings at a Glance (why the premium changed)
Need Help? (contact options)
Personalized Findings: A fill-in-the-blank style sentence explains changes in plain language, e.g.,
“After reviewing your payroll records and employee classifications, we identified [e.g., a change in employee class codes]. This resulted in a [increase/decrease] in your premium to accurately reflect your coverage needs, based on the actual payroll of [$actual] compared to the original estimate of [$estimate].”Action-Oriented Guidance: Bold, direct instructions reduce uncertainty and support faster follow-up.
Glossary for Transparency: A dedicated glossary page explains technical terms in everyday language, presented in the same order they appear in the letter, so policyholders can easily cross-reference and understand key concepts.
Plain English Throughout: Jargon-free, empathetic copy ensures policyholders feel confident navigating their results without needing specialized insurance knowledge.
Testing.
To evaluate the three proposed solutions, we conducted two types of experiments with policyholders and auditors:
Test A (Pilot Test)
Conducted with 26 policyholders (13 in a test group and 13 in a control group), this test focused on the Audit Readiness Check and the Redesigned Audit Summary Document.The test group received the Audit Readiness Check 30 days before their audit notice and the Redesigned Audit Summary after their audit was complete.
The control group experienced the standard process, receiving the usual audit notice and the original summary document.
We compared both groups by tracking:
Completion rates and responses to the readiness check
When audits were submitted
The quality of submissions
The number and type of follow-ups required
Policyholder calls and questions about the process, documentation, or results
When audits were ultimately closed
This allowed us to measure concrete differences in efficiency, clarity, and policyholder experience.
Test B (Prototype Usability Test)
Conducted with 12 participants (6 policyholders with prior experience using the old portal and 6 internal auditors), this test evaluated the Online Audit+ prototype.Participants were asked to complete an audit in the new portal while we observed their interactions. We noted moments of hesitation, re-reading, or confusion, and followed up with casual questions to gather feedback on:
The clarity of instructions
How questions were segmented and designed
Design and experience of the new portal
Overall ease of use and confidence in completing the audit
This combination of structured pilot testing and qualitative usability testing gave us both quantitative impact measures and rich qualitative insights to refine the concepts.
Impact.
Early testing showed strong potential for improvement:
36% reduction in audit processing time and follow-up inquiries
29% decrease in customer service calls related to audits
78% increase in policyholder satisfaction with the audit process
Significant gains in clarity, confidence, and overall user experience
