Digital Inclusion Standard

Services covered by the Digital Inclusion Standard

The Inclusion Standard is mandatory and applies from 1 January 2025 to informational and transactional digital services that are:

subject to the requirements of the Investment Oversight Framework (IOF)
new or replacement public facing
new staff facing
all existing public facing

Informational services provide information to users, such as reports, fact sheets or videos. They may include:
- government agency websites
- smart answers and virtual assistants
- e-learning
- publications
- online libraries
- databases and data warehouses.
Transactional services lead to a change in government-held records, typically involving an exchange of information, money, licences or goods.
Examples of transactional services include:
- logging in to a portal or platform
- submitting a claim
- registering a business
- updating contact details
- lodging a tax return
- subscribing to newsletters
- grant applications
- public consultation submissions.
Staff facing services provide information to government employees or support employee transactions. They may include:
- intranets
- learning management systems
- records management systems
- case/client management systems
- decision-making systems
- any systems or platforms utilised by staff.
For more information on how ‘portals’ are defined, please refer to the Australian Government Architecture (AGA).

Implementation timeline

For new and replacement public-facing digital services, the Inclusion Standard came into effect on 1 January 2025.
For new and replacement staff-facing digital services, the Inclusion Standard came into effect on 1 January 2025.
For all existing public-facing digital services, the Inclusion Standard came into effect on 1 January 2026.

Next page

Meeting the Digital Inclusion Standard