MAXIMUS-izing and HMO Bozo web designers

I am ever amazed by websites. Currently I am amazed by

http://www.yourtickettowork.com/




I was sent by mail a letter from Social Security and encouraged to register for the your-ticket-to-work program which the federal government subcontracted to MAXIMUS. No instructions were sent to me in terms of how to navigate the site despite the fact that I am a TBI. One would think given the people who will be using the site something like registering would be easy to follow step by step, obvious link to obvious link- that the information would be front and center.
I have a brain injury with damage to my visual cortex which means highly complicated visual fields are difficult for me. I need for information to be front and center. An that's part of why I don't understand how the your-ticket-to-work site- was designed for or by MAXIMUS. I don't understand how this page was designed considering it's audience which includes people like me with organic brain differences and I've come to the conclussion the site wasn't designed for the people in which MAXIMUS has been subcontracted to provide a service for. Me and peolpe like me- we're not even on their radar.


 The task assigned to me was and is: register for the your-ticket-to-work program but the site clearly wasn't designed for registering. It's primary purpose in terms of design is not registering the disabled or providing useful information for them. The "consumers" were not are not the audience which the site was designed for. Whether this was and is conscious or unconscious I don't and can't know.


Whoever designed the site felt the most important information was and is "how many people are elligible". Personally I don't care how many people are elligible it's not relevent information for anyone actually using the service. The information that is front and center is relevent from a PR stand point, from an investor or  business participant standpoint but not from a customer standpoint, not for those people for which the program itself exists.


But then again is that why the program exists as a matter of practice? Does it exist to deliver services or to transfer taxpayer dollars to private for profit companies under the pressumption that socially services are just another widget?




 Subcontracting services to a private entity essentially means that money for the help and support of the disbaled is being funneled to a private for profit company- a company that doesn't comsider registering the disabled into their program a high enough priority to provide an easy or even accessible way to register.


People are worried about socialism? Umm - gee tax payer  dollars being diverted directly to corporations- the very entities that fund our elections, that lobby the congress on both the federal and state levels. To me that sounds a lot scarier. But what do I know - I have a brain injury.


 Back to my adventures with corporate bureaucracies which are supposed to be so much more efficient than a government. I have two tasks: register for the your-ticket-to-work program and pick a Medicaid HMO- that's right folks Medicaid has been subcontracted to the private sector.


The same we-did-not-construct-the sites-to-be-functional-outside-of-PR purposes is present in the HMO options I need to choose from regarding Medicaid in the state of SC. Six companies and with the exception of one HMO every site was designed not for efficiency but as a PR device. On most of the sites it is impossible to get  simple provider information, on only one site can you type in the name of the doctor and his address and get an answer as to whether s/he's on their provider list


The HMO's were subcontracted of the argument thatprivate is better than public -corporations do it smarter and leaner. Really? because that's not been my experience so far.


Smarter and cheaper would be  a simple fill in the blank search avaliable for every Medicaid HMO to check if your doctors are on their lists. Only one SC. Medicaid HMO provider has the ability to quickly check their providers online. Five of the six providers require that you the consumer call a 1-800 and that every individual provider inquiry be handled by hand, by a paid tele-person checking the list for you. Instead of letting the cutomer do the work these HMO would rather employ tele-people. How exactly is that efficient?


 Only one HMO essentially made use of the internet in their site's design providing  a simple fill in the blank search connected to their list of providers. All the other Medicaid HMO's it's call a 1-800 number so a person can type in those fields for you? Totally friggin' inefficient. If they can't do even that simple, simple action of filtering waste in the design of their own system how exactly is it that they could ever hope to manage healthcare efficiently?


And as for MAXIMUS, they can't even manage to provide an easy, no hassle way to register for the governement program they are now paid to dispense to the citizens for the governement. But maybe, maybe Maximus is just like the health insurance industry: existing not to provide the product in which they've been tasked but to impede consumers/citizens from gaining access the product or program itself.


That's how it seems from my perspective.




This American idea that private indutry whose sole purpose is to make a profit is the best means of administering services is not correct. Who delivers more for less- that would be non profits. And even on their sites there is this same issue of "who did you design this page- this site for".


Mostly the websites seem to be constructed for PR practices- as an online PR package- that's what I see. The sites weren't designed for users they were designed for press, investor information but not to get any actual work done- and I really don't get that