C18580 Digital Accessibility Partner

Tender description

Why the Work is Being Done Home Office users and employees rightly expect modern technology which helps users receive the service they require and supports employees in protecting the public. An important part of delivering modern technology is ensuring that it’s accessible and inclusive to the widest user base possible not only to meet our legal obligations but because it’s vital that anyone can access our services or be employed by us. Through our increased digitisation of services and the use of user centred design, we are increasing the opportunities to engage digitally with government services. This presents us with a need to work with suppliers who can provide the necessary knowledge, skills and experience to help to delivery teams to create accessible and inclusive services consistently. Problem to Be Solved Government services need to meet user needs and be designed to ensure that everyone can use them. However, a large proportion still fail to achieve this. Whilst we’ve increased the capacity of our internal accessibility team, the demand for support from service delivery teams continues to outstrip what the team can deliver. As a result, we’re looking to build a strategic relationship to help meet the demand for expert accessibility skills to help ensure our teams can deliver accessible services consistently. Who Are the Users Home Office customers and staff. Early Market Engagement Work Already Done Existing Team A centralised civil servant team of accessibility consultants currently exists. Supplier will be working with distributed delivery teams (mixture of civil service and third party) and with the centralised team. Current Phase Not applicable Work Location The majority of the programmes and projects are located within the M25 but the successful supplier must be capable of providing the service nationwide. Working Arrangments Likely to be a mixture of on site and remote delivery depending on the individual project. Some projects will require resource to be embedded within the delivery team, some may be possible to do from supplier premises. Security Clearance Up to SC Additional T&Cs 1.Travel expenses are payable for journeys outside the M25 (for Greater London based SOWs) or for journeys greater than 10 miles of other SOW base locations, where approved in advance by the customer and in line with HO Travel policy (subsistence is not payable). 2. Professions rate caps will be applied to all standard roles at all SFIA levels. SFIA 1, 2,6 and 7 levels are not required. 3. Seasonal furloughs may be required. 4. Maximum sub-contractor margin caps will be applied. 5. Individual SOWs may be required at fixed price, T&M or capped T&M. Skills & Experience Demonstratable experience of supporting 5 agile delivery teams concurrently to integrate accessibility into their product / service. Demonstratable experience of researching and understanding the needs of people with disabilities Experience of working with delivery teams to building their capabilities in delivering accessible and inclusive products / services Demonstrable experience of conducting user focused accessibility testing, user focused defect prioritisation and providing fix solutions Demonstratable experience of identifying and implementing workarounds and adjustments for disabled users using a journey whilst defects are resolved Demonstrable experience of identifying accessibility issues beyond the scope of WCAG2.1, such as digital interface optimisation, offline contexts and policies to build truly inclusive services across multiple teams concurrently. Demonstrable experience of recruiting a diverse workforce and promoting a supportive and inclusive culture Demonstrable experience of deploying innovative approaches to test products and service accessibility Demonstrable experience of managing and overcoming resistance among team members, leaders and stakeholders to make the effort to changes relating to accessibility Demonstrable expert usage of Assistive Technology (AT) and understanding the needs of people with disabilities Nice to Haves Demonstrable (and recent) experience of supporting teams to meet the government’s Service Standard Demonstrable (and recent) experience of placing accessibility consultants into agile delivery teams in government Experience and understanding of the Public Sector Bodies (Website and Mobile) Accessibility Regulations (PSBAR) Demonstrable experience of integrating and collaboration with an existing in-house accessibility team No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 4 Proposal Criteria Essential skills (from stage 1) Approach and methodology How the approach meets the requirements Capability and capacity to provide specialist support Added value Accessibility of submission Practical Scenario Cultural Fit Criteria Work as a team with our organisation and other suppliers Share knowledge and experience with team members and replacement teams Be comfortable standing up for their discipline Can work with teams with low accessibility expertise Practices inclusion throughout their work Payment Approach Capped time and materials Assessment Method Case study Work history Presentation Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 60% Cultural fit 10% Price 30% Questions from Suppliers No questions have been answered yet Budget range