GOVERNMENT SERVICES

🇮🇹 Italian Pension — Proof of Life & Pension Services

Making essential pension services more accessible for Italian citizens living abroad.

Partners: Solution architects · Product Pre-Sales
· Government stakeholders

Digitizing a critical service for older citizens

Italian pension holders living abroad need to periodically complete Proof of Life verification to continue receiving payments.

For older citizens, people with limited mobility, or those who depend on family support, completing this process in person can be a significant burden.

The opportunity

Explore how digital identity and biometric verification could simplify pension services, reducing the need for in-person visits while supporting people who need assistance completing the process.

From research to accessible experiences

Accelerating insight to action with AI

This project was also where I began integrating emerging AI tools into my design process.

I used them to understand the pension landscape, strengthen the business case, explore potential solutions, and move from research into prototypes more quickly.

My approach connected four activities:

Research and discovery
Understanding pension requirements, existing processes, and opportunities for digital services.

Solution mapping
Working with Product and Solution Architects to align user needs with available identity and verification capabilities.

AI-assisted prototyping
Exploring concepts and accelerating the development of interactive experiences.

Research and iteration
Evaluating the proposed journeys and refining the experience based on feedback.

A research learning that changed the thinking

What we initially assumed: One digital journey could work for everyone.

What research revealed: Some pension holders could complete the process independently, while others needed help from someone they trusted.

This led us to design two intentional paths: self-service and delegate-supported experiences, rather than treating delegation as an exception.

Bringing the experience to life

Supporting pensioners at home and abroad

To explore these different needs, we developed scenarios around three people:

Maria Bianchi, 69
A pension holder comfortable managing her services independently.

Giovanni Rossi, 85
An older pension holder who needs assistance completing certain tasks.

Antonio Rossi, 38
Giovanni's trusted representative, who helps manage pension-related services on his behalf.

Their experiences helped us explore how different levels of independence and assistance could be supported through connected government services.

The experience

01. Self-service: Change of address abroad

Maria needs to update her address after moving outside Italy.

The experience guides her through updating her information, verifying her identity using an NFC-enabled document, completing a selfie and liveness check, and confirming the changes.

Design consideration: Replace unnecessary in-person verification with a secure, understandable digital journey.

02. Periodic Proof of Life

A year later, Maria receives a reminder to complete her annual Proof of Life verification.

Using her existing digital wallet, she confirms her identity, completes a liveness check, and receives confirmation.

Design consideration: Turn recurring verification into a simple, predictable process rather than another complex application.

03. Delegate-supported: Power of Attorney

Antonio helps his father, Giovanni, manage pension services.

He authenticates using his own wallet, provides proof of authorization, selects the person he represents, and assists with address or payment updates.

Giovanni still completes the required identity and liveness verification himself.

Design consideration: Allow trusted representatives to help without removing the pension holder's control over identity verification.

04. Delegate-supported annual Proof of Life

When Giovanni's next annual verification is due, Antonio receives the reminder and helps guide him through the process.

Giovanni completes the required liveness check, and the process concludes with confirmation.

Design consideration: Support continuity between the representative and pension holder while keeping their responsibilities clear.

Designing for accessibility and trust

The experience focused on three priorities:

• Accessibility: Supporting pension holders with different levels of digital confidence and independence.

• Flexibility: Providing both self-service and delegate-supported journeys.

• Security and control: Allowing representatives to assist while preserving the pension holder's required identity verification.

These considerations helped us move beyond a one-size-fits-all approach to government services.

From journey to interactive prototype

Using Figma and AI-assisted design techniques, I translated the service requirements into connected experiences covering address changes, identity verification, delegated assistance, and recurring Proof of Life.

The prototypes helped communicate the proposed solutions, explore technical feasibility, and support discussions with Product, Research, and Architecture partners.

The outcome

Designing for different levels of independence

The proposed experience demonstrated how digital identity and verification capabilities could simplify pension services for Italian citizens living abroad.

More importantly, research helped shift the design from a single digital process to two complementary experiences that better reflected how people manage these services.

The project also helped shape my approach to AI-assisted design, showing how emerging tools could accelerate exploration while keeping research, accessibility, and human judgment central to design decisions.