In order for them to be compliant with the government’s own service standards guidelines the Home Office is seeking a supplier to undertake a two year contract to create a user-focused service design that updates a number of public and internal digital services contained within its Digital, Data and Technology directorate.
The supplier sought needs to have at least two years of experience in building services that meet the governments service standards, as well as creating a user-centric system that meets both business and user needs.
In its contract notice they state that: “We are increasingly reliant on technology to support the Home Office in its role to lead on immigration and passports, drugs policy, crime policy and counter-terrorism, and to ensure visible, responsive and accountable policing in the UK. We need to design and deliver technology which supports the transformation of the Home Office and the modernisation of our processes making them fit for a digital future.”
The successful candidate will work in-house with a civil service led team. Most of the projects and programmes that need to be brought up to date are located within the M25, but they should expect to work at a national level.
The Service Standards Problem
The Home Office notes that government services should meet users’ needs, but unfortunately a ‘large proportion’ of these services fail to meet the government service standards.
The government’s ‘service standards’ is a 14 point guideline designed to help government workers create more open and user friendly public services. It contains points such as ‘create a secure service which protects users’ privacy’ and ‘provide a joined up experience across all channels’.
The department have highlighted four key issues that the supplier will have to address in order to meet its required digital service needs. It will have to;
- Understanding users and their needs
- Solving a whole problem for users
- Making the service simple to use
- Making sure everyone can use the service
The Home office notes that: “Growing demand for user-centred design capability means we need experts in content design, interaction design, user research, service design and accessibility to increase our capacity and support efforts to deliver user-centred services that meet Service Standard requirements.”
Suppliers have until the 13 of December to apply and will be expected to commence work no later than the 10 of February.
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