Digital by Default
Bassetlaw’s Journey
SOCITM East Midlands
Andy Brammall
Strategic ICT Manager
Bassetlaw District Council
The Vision
“Services that are so good people will prefer
to use them, while ensuring that those who
are not able to go online are given the
support they need to do so.”
What does that mean?
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Q. Deploy Web forms?
Q. Self Service enable the CRM?
Q. Applications Vendors web portals?
Q. IOS / Android App?
Q. Contact Forms and Return Calls?
Q. Deploy Live Chat?
A. No!
Problems with Old Processes
 High volumes of phone calls and face to face activity
 Labour intensive
 Website informational, not transactional
 Services only accessible 9 till 5
 Manual Records and Scheduling
 Manual submission of documents and postage
 “Stop Starts” in the process
 No customer progression updates
 No frontline and joined up intelligence
 Low citizen perception of the council’s front door
 An IOS app that is not used
Exemplar Processes
Focussing organisational thinking on design and how
citizens expect to transact
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DVLA Car Tax – End to end process, including
verification and evidence checking, and elimination of
original documents / signatures
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Asda Home Delivery – Inventory of goods
and services, shopping basket, payment
and delivery slot booking
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Amazon Online Shopping - catalogue, basket, payment
and customer feedback / community
Digital by Default Standards
 Automation, Self Service and End to End processes
NOT simply providing web-forms actioned by back office
 Designed for Mobile
Processes accessible and usable on any mobile device
 Elimination of “Dual Key-in”
Information gathered from self service processes must be automatically
populated into the back-office systems, and known details about customers self
populated to current and future transactions
 Processes should be intelligent &…
provide conditional interrogation and adaptive process flows
(only ask what we need to)
 Automated Verification Checking
Where supplementary evidence is required, these should be made electronically,
either by image attachment / upload, verification with back office systems, or by
Risk Based software systems.
 Underpinned by clear corporate governance
Avoiding “Digital by Deception”
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“Submit form and someone will contact you”
“Print this form out, sign it, then mail it to us”
“Post original copies of your documents to us”
Dual entry (manual input of forms)
“Digital Facades” to old webpages
Web enabling as-is processes
Like for Like digitising of a physical form
Dominance of Informational over Transactional
“Nearly Digital” standards for processes not DbyD at launch
Processes with the Greatest Impact
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Missed bin and re-arranging collection
Medical waste collection and replacement sharps bins
Bulky Waste Goods (including payment, and booking/scheduling)
Booking and progress of new or replacement wheelie bins
Council Tax Setting up a direct debit
Benefits – Claim and Claim Progress
Planning Queries – various , automated through IDOX
Comments and Complaints
Council Tax Payments (including account balance and transaction queries)
Council Tax Transaction Query
Payments
These Transactions account for 80% of the Person to Person transactions
Corporate Support is Key
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Clear business case with ROI
Clear focus on improving the lives of citizens,
while delivering automation, efficiency and large
realisable savings
Big bang maximum impact
Unified corporate approach
Stand apart from the crowd
Early win on open data site
Lots and Lots of Technology Evangelism!
Critical Success Factors
 A single corporate led project (not service led projects)
 Clear Goal: Full Fat Digital, not Digital by Deception
 Strong unified political and corporate commitment with focus on
quality not time and recognition of the project potential
 Commitment of resources to single corporate project and solution
 Clear DbyD Design Standard and Design Authority
 Business involved in process mapping & redesign around Digital
Standards
 The right people, right supplier, right product
Solution and Supplier Choice
 Supplier with shared vision and understanding of DbyD
 No re-packaged CRMs, patched together web interfaces
 No “it can’t be done” or “that’s not what other Councils
are doing”
 No re-branding it “Digital by Design” or “Digital First”
 No being sold what the suppliers wanted to sell us, or compromising
Design Principals
 A number of big players admitted their product wasn’t up to it.
 Solution needed to be powerful, affordable, adaptable, easy to
deploy…..
Meritec’s Enterprise System Builder (ESB)
Solution Deliverables
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Single Customer Account and History for all processes
Single Customer Information Hub
Migration of Existing Internet and Intranet to new CMS
Online Payment Module Integration (+ Mobile Device)
Designed for Mobile Website & “The Bassetlaw Button”
All transactions and information wikis button driven
Customer Survey, satisfaction and transaction monitoring
Digital Design Skills Knowledge
Live Chat
Customer Services / Assisted Digital Culture
“Omni Channel” consistent solution for online
and assisted digital services alike
Phase 1 Processes
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Benefit Application
Direct Debit Setup
Waste Services Commissioning
MOT Testing Online
Comments and Complaints
Online Payments + Balances,
Transaction History and Mobile Enablement
Market Traders Mobile Payment and Accounts
IDOX Planning Self Service Integration
Replacement of all remaining email,
telephone links, pdf downloads, and
webforms with “Nearly Digital Processes”
Benefits / Outputs
 Fully Digital by Default for the largest transactions
and “Nearly Digital” for all other transactions
 Customer Information Hub provides “Assisted Digital”
 Mobile access to services any device, any location
 Reduction in face to face transactions
 Increased back-office automation
 Open Source
 Allows rapid deployment of new services to be “digital by default”
 Governance mechanisms for on-going service development
 Customer Information Hub and Single Customer Account interface
provides high quality, rich, customer intelligence for both customer
and council
Phase 2 Processes
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Benefit Change of Circumstances
Business, Landlord and Partner Accounts
Planning advanced automation with IDOX
Apply DbyD to Nearly Digital Processes
Case Management (Members, Economic Development, Legal etc.)
Tree Safety Management
Homelessness
Environmental Health Processes
Town Hall Events
Members Grants
Internal process automation
…Requests for Phase 2 Prioritisation Coming in Thick and Fast!
Take a test drive…
www.bassetlaw.gov.uk
www.data.bassetlaw.gov.uk