For a channel shift programme to be successful, it has to deliver services that people use repeatedly, in turn generating measurable efficiencies and savings.
However, it's easier to move a public service online, than to measure the effectiveness of the web service you launched last month. Recent data from the Socitm Website Performance Service highlighted this issue.
The data shows that 43 million visits were made to UK council websites in August 2013, compared with 27.6 million in August 2012 – an increase of nearly 56%. Yet at the same time, failed website visits also increased to over 23% in August 2013, compared with 17% in the same month a year ago. It’s perhaps no surprise that visitor satisfaction with these sites averaged at just over 27% in the 12 months to August 2013.
It’s encouraging that more people are using online services, but the increase in failure rates for users puts their longer-term adoption at risk. As the Government’s digital strategy document put it, 'we need to deliver services so good that people prefer to use them'.
It’s only by measuring the long-term adoption of services that we can establish which ones citizens are actively choosing, and which deliver the maximum benefit from being moved online. So what should be measured to track the adoption of services?
The Government’s Service Design Manual gives useful yardsticks for this, including:
Comparing tasks carried out in two different ways, e.g. number of registration requests completed online, compared with offline channels
Determining the user transaction costs through each channel
Setting the right metrics for measuring digital take-up
Two recent examples from councils show how these measurements can be applied to gauge the adoption and success of online services, and to drive further channel shift.
When choosing services to migrate online, transaction-based processes (signing up to a new initiative or making a payment) are a good starting point. Harrow Council launched its online payment and appeals service for parking and traffic enforcement Penalty Charge Notices (PCNs) in 2010, to ease pressure on its call centre and One Stop Shop staff.
In two years from deploying the online service, built using Firmstep’s Platform, the council was able to discontinue face-to-face and telephone enquiries completely for processing PCNs: it now handles over 4,000 online submissions per month, with savings estimated at £90,000 per year.
By repeatedly measuring service adoption and usage, the Council was confident that the service addressed users’ needs, and was also able to quantify savings through understanding the online transaction costs compared with phone or in-person processes. This supported full online migration of the service.
Channel shift is also an efficient way to support subscription-based services, giving a direct revenue-based measure of a service’s success.
North Kesteven District Council turned its green waste collection from a service that was a cost for them to provide, following withdrawal of central Government funding in 2012, to being fully self-supported. The Council proposed launching an opt-in garden waste collection service, with a charge of £25 per year. To make the service as accessible as possible, it decided to enable residents to register and pay for the service either using an intelligent online form, or by phone.
In 10 weeks from launching the service, 25,000 households (over half of those served by the council) signed up, generating service income of over £625,000 for the council. More than half signed up online, reducing the need to recruit extra staff to handle subscriptions by phone and enabling more funding for the service itself.
Brett Husbands is CEO of Firmstep
