Development of website for Drinking Water Inspectorate

Tender description

Summary of the work DWI aims to upgrade its website to one suitable for the needs of a modern regulator fulfilling essential public functions. The new platform should be engaging, accessible and easy to update by a team without coding expertise. A reliable and cost-effective contractor will build the website and support its rollout. Expected Contract Length 2 years (website design first, then small retainer for trouble-shooting) Latest start date Saturday 1 August 2020 Budget Range £10,000 - £25,000 Why the Work is Being Done The DWI relies on its website to meet statutory reporting duties, provide regulatory guidance to industry and to communicate with its many stakeholders (as a devolved function, we require a website separate from Defra’s). Recently introduced legislation places a new statutory duty on DWI to prepare and publish a report on the quality of water intended for human consumption, with the objective of informing consumers. As such, we require a more easily navigable, reliable and user-friendly website. In addition, incoming regulation requires us to improve our accessibility. Ideally, by 23rd September 2020, our website should be compatible with screen readers and speech recognition software. In addition, by December 2021, we aim to have in place a post code search facility to make the information directly relevant to consumers and easy to access: the upgraded website should be capable of hosting this (although this is not part of the present tender). It is essential that the DWI retains full independence to update and change the website as required. This is likely to require a content management system and DWI staff trained to use it. The website does not have particularly high traffic, but it is essential that it runs without outages. Problem to Be Solved The DWI website performance has deteriorated over time and urgently needs an upgrade: - It cannot support postcode search functionality, which is something the DWI will need in the long term; - It is not sufficiently engaging, accessible and modern. Its outdated design does not inspire confidence or interest from the public and does not make reasonable adjustments for disabled users. It does not have a security certificate or HTTP status, with the result that some browsers will warn users against viewing it and limitations in what we can do and how we engage with stakeholders. This is detrimental to our reputation. - It cannot currently support analytics for us to understand how the pages are used and how we can improve. - It regularly crashes due to errors in the code caused by the outdated way of updating content using Dreamweaver, which means that for significant periods, our stakeholders are unable to access essential information; DWI staff need to make daily updates to the website using a modern, supported content management system, with a support contract offering a help desk to troubleshoot urgent issues and a contract manager for regular meetings to address more complex issues. Who Are the Users a) As a water company representative, I need to be able to access information about current regulations, requirements and any new developments in order to fulfil my responsibility to provide clean and safe drinking water to the public; b) As a member of the public, I need to be able to access information about my water supply in order to get assurance that it is safe for me, and find out more about my water company’s performance, as well as the safeguards that are in place to protect me. c) As a local authority I need to access information on current regulations, guidance documents, reporting requirements and list of test laboratories to fulfil my legal responsibilities. d) As a product installer / user / producer I need to access the applications, guidance documents, testing protocols, and full list of approved products to be used in contact with drinking water. e) As a research body I need to access information on DWI funded published research reports and future research competitions. Early Market Engagement Our research has been internal. We work closely with our stakeholders and understand their needs and expectations. Furthermore, many of our colleagues have joined the DWI following a career in the water industry, and therefore have first-hand experience of interacting with the DWI as one of the key external stakeholders. We have a public-facing team who field queries and messages from the public and who have been able to advise us on key engagement themes. Work Already Done N/A Existing Team A single supplier is required to develop, host and maintain a new website. There are no other suppliers involved in the delivery of the product. You may have to deal with our legacy supplier (Atos) to re-point the URL. Internally the website is currently managed and updated by one colleague using Dreamweaver. The wider DWI team consists mainly of scientists and water industry experts, who do not have any expertise in coding or website management. We have a data team, who work with data software (e.g. SQL). The day-to-day website management should not require advanced coding skills. Current Phase Discovery Skills & Experience • Skills to design, develop and set up hosting of a website on the existing DWI domain • Skills to put in place a content management system for DWI staff • Skills to remotely train up to four DWI staff in use of the content management system • Experience in working to style sheets • Ability to collaborate with other developers in future • Skills to ensure the new website is complaint with the requirements set out in Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 • Skills to support the roll-out of the website and then fix any issues which might surface during use; • Skills to host and support the website for two years with a minimum availability of 99.95% • Have experience working with small organisations • Skills and experience to deliver this project at pace Nice to Haves • Have higher clearance at administrator level (SC clearance) • Experience working with other public sector organisations, regulators or large hosting providers • Evidence of previous training of users in the content management system and ability to do this remotely Work Location The DWI is based in London (Nobel House, 17 Smith Square, SW1P 3JR) although in line with government guidance, we are currently working remotely until further notice. Work does not have to be completed on-site unless this is required for technical reasons. Working Arrangments Whilst key check-in meetings may take place in person at the DWI offices (if this is possible in line with the safety measures necessary around Covid-19), we expect most of the work to be completed remotely. Our team have video conferencing capacity and are happy to use it to communicate with the contractors. Security Clearance All staff involved should have BPSS clearance. It is preferable for administrators have SC clearance. Additional T&Cs The contract must provide a guarantee of limited downtime due to unplanned outages for the website once it is fully developed and running. The uptime must be greater than 99.95% (i.e. outages must be less than 4 hrs 12 minutes in total duration each year), excluding planned outages for maintenance. The website must be accessible to users with hearing, visual and cognitive impairments who use software tailored to their needs. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 3 Proposal Criteria • Technical solution • Approach and methodology • How the approach meets our needs • How the approach meets the DWI's goals • Estimated timeframes (start ASAP preferable) • Risks / dependencies and offered approaches to manage them • Team structure • Value for money Cultural Fit Criteria • Provide a personal service • Work flexibly and remotely as a team with our organisation and other suppliers • Be transparent and collaborative when making decisions • Take responsibility for their work • Share knowledge and experience with other team members • Challenge the status quo • Can work with clients with low technical expertise Payment Approach Fixed price Assessment Method • Work history • Reference Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 60% Cultural fit 15% Price 25% Questions from Suppliers 1. Hello. Does the £10,000 – £25,000 budget range include VAT? Yes, the £10,000 - £25,000 budget includes VAT. 2. Hi, is the budget range just for the development of the website or does it include the support and hosting as well? The budget range includes support and hosting for up to two years. 3. May you please confirm the budget for this project? The budget range is £10,000 to £25,000. Price makes up %25 of the scoring criteria. 4. Is there a preferred platform for the website e.g. Umbraco, Wordpress? The platform and content management system would need to be user friendly, supported by regular updates where appropriate and include a range of standard functionality. Wordpress is a good example of a platform that would meet these criteria and our existing website is hosted on an older Wordpress platform which would simply migration.However, we are not committed to using Wordpress and are open to discussions with suppliers about the best platform to use if there are better alternatives. 5. Please could you confirm if the supplier will be required to migrate the content of the existing website or if the content team will cover this? Yes, the supplier will be required to migrate the content. However, some new content may be added and existing content removed and instructions will be provided regarding this.