It’s been a bit of a quiet atmosphere this week for the Digital Team as we have numerous team members away. But alas we shall persist… here is what we’ve been working on this week.

Payments in modern life

Paying for something online is something most of us take for granted in this modern life. Some of us may argue it’s too easy to click and buy something online, as we buy a book, cat food or a new kettle in the time it takes to boil a kettle.

It’s not so simple for people currently applying for NRW permitting and licences. From conversations with colleagues and more in-depth research and analysis – (not being able to take) online payments often tops the list of pain points and “quick wins” for our organisation.

Our working hypothesis is that we can make use of the GOV.UK.Pay component, so that people can easily pay the right amount, and reduce the need for colleagues to chase up payments. It’s likely to be a bit more complicated – as we’ll need to work out references, and integration payments with internal systems. There’s also references, refunds, cost centres, form builder, service design considerations and a whole lot of other internal workings to untangle.

Earlier this year our team got quite far with creating a prototype for online payments using GOV.UK Pay, so we’re not starting from scratch. Several colleagues have also explored the opportunities (and challenges). So Heledd’s latest mission is to bring together colleagues with more knowledge than her about payments, billing and technology and see if we can work together to make online payments a reality and if (or when) we encounter actual barriers, we work as a team to resolve them. Wish us luck!

2 angry looking seagulls on a roof, taken from NRW Bangor office

Meeting with the species team

Heledd, Sam, James and Phil joined a meeting with the permitting reform and species teams.

This meeting was the first of many with the teams as we start work on improving the species area of our website.

We shared information with the group on how the digital team operate, and what our approach to this work will be. The species team shared with us the type of queries they receive and the most common problems they face as a team.

The species team receive lots of queries from our users about gulls, it’s no surprise to us that this happens. The only information currently on the website is a Summary of different methods of deterring birds and their relative effectiveness - we do love these catchy little titles.

Our users have no clear information about gulls, so they call our customer contact centre. These queries are then passed on to the poor species team.

This information was useful for the content designers in our team Sam and Phil. We are forming a plan to tackle these problems. It’s our aim to reduce enquires to the species team to free them up to do more permitting work. Our users will also benefit by finding the answer to their questions quicker and easier.

We also have a long-term plan, September to December, to improve the species forms and web content on our site.

Other things we’ve been working on this week:

  • Phil, Lucinda, Sam, Sophie, and James have begun outlining our team’s new learning materials around key digital topics, such as understanding accessibility and collecting analytics from webpages. We’re still in the research phase now, but we plan to incorporate immersive experiences to help attendees understand the challenges presented when content is not user-friendly.
  • The content officers have been publishing all sorts of reports and webpage updates. It’s been a very busy time for our small team, so please bear with us as we get to your requests.
  • Toyah and Sam finalised the new band 1 marine licensing content and form, ready for translation.
  • Lucinda has been designing flows for a log in system for users signed up for flood warnings. This is new territory for Lucinda but James has helped by giving her a sense check and listening to her talk it through.

Fun fact

Since we have been talking about seagulls this week, did you know… seagulls can drink both fresh and salt water. Most animals are unable to do this, but gulls have a special pair of glands right above their eyes which are specifically designed to flush the salt from their systems through openings in the bill.