https://dataingovernment.blog.gov.uk/patent-renewals-service-assessment/
Patent Renewals – Service Assessment
The patent renewal service allows customers to pay for renewal of their patent online. The service has in-built validation: If the patent is renewable, the service will return patent details for the number entered, together with the renewal fee due. If the patent is not renewable an appropriate error message is given.
https://www.gov.uk/transformation/renew-patent
Department / Agency:
BIS / IPO
Date of Assessment:
16/5/2014
Moving to:
Live
Result:
Pass
Lead Assessor:
B. Andrews
Service Manager:
G. Court
Digital Leader:
T. Knighton
Assessment report
The Patent Renewal service is seeking permission to be branded a Live Digital by Default service on the service.gov.uk domain.
Outcome of service assessment
After completing our assessment GDS can confirm the Patent Renewal service has shown sufficient evidence of meeting the Digital by Default Service Standard and should go Live as a Digital by Default service on GOV.UK. The service can now remove any Beta branding.
Reasons
The service was assessed against and has met all 26 points of the Digital by Default Service Standard.
The team demonstrate good user research practices. They've conducted user research with all their user groups, and are using this insight to shape their service.
They have access to call centre data, and paper renewals to act as a benchmark for the online service.
The service provided evidence that AD user research was undertaken, that the service understands their users needs and that appropriate channels are available for people who are unable to use the digital service independently, including the potential for face to face support at several locations across the UK.
They achieved a good reduction in cost per transaction when compared to the paper based service.
Recommendations
- The service should work more closely with the patent libraries to ensure that face to face provision of assisted digital is in line with GDS guidance in the Service Manual. This should include an element of digital inclusion and a mechanism for gathering feedback and monitoring user satisfaction.
- The service should continue to monitor and be prepared for a potential increase in assisted digital users if / when the paper channel is withdrawn completely.
- The service should continue to work with the GDS assisted digital team as the cross-government model for assisted digital support is developed, to share best practice and ensure that provision remains consistent with the government standard.
- There are some design and content issues which mean the service is less simple and intuitive than it could be. These issues should be addressed at the earliest opportunity and GDS will share some detailed recommendations on how to fix these issues.
- As discussed in the assessment the service should enhance its current analytics package in the next few weeks, so that this will allow them to map the user journey more effectively. This includes tracking how many people reach certain parts of the form, and differentiating between users who exit or click on an external link. This is necessary to give the team the more granular view of their service to identify problems, and determine whether changes made as a result of user research insights have the desired effect.
- As part of its IT Infrastructure Roadmap or within 6 months, the IPO should introduce a new analytics package for patent renewals producing data required by the performance platform, and comply with Service Standard guidance.
- The service manager should provide GDS with a url for their github repository.
Next Steps
This service has been given approval to go Live as a Digital by Default service.
