King’s Lynn and West Norfolk has used innovative mapping and APIs to streamline online fly-tipping reporting, improving data accuracy, resolving cases faster and delivering 83 per cent cost savings
Fly-tipping is a blight on communities and can cost councils significant sums of money and time. To help tackle the problem across King’s Lynn and West Norfolk, the council is using an online mapping service for reporting incidents.
What makes King’s Lynn and West Norfolk different from other councils is that it is using IEG4’s APIs to automate processes involved in the fly-tipping service from report to resolution, thereby reducing error and duplication whilst significantly improving efficiency.
Jo Hillard, Council Information Centre (CIC) assistant manager (pictured below), explains: “The IEG4 APIs are the glue between our online form, OpenProcess EDMS (which updates our online account), the ReportIT mapping solution and our Idox back office system.
“All information from the customer is collected from the form for action. And, because the connections are bi-directional, every single action that is then taken by a CIC advisor in Idox is mirrored in the other systems. Automating the entire process has saved us a lot of time.”
The CIC handles all fly-tipping reports from customers and receives around 100 every month. Customers previously contacted the CIC to give a description of location and nature of the incident. CIC advisors would take the details and input them into Idox. This process would take about 20-30 minutes per report.
However, customer contact did not end there, says Hillard: “Nearly 50 per cent of calls were on progress chasing, and a lot of time in the initial enquiry would be spent trying to establish where the fly-tipped items were - before going down the route of whether it was on private or public land and our responsibility to clear, before sorting out the actual clean up itself.
“Now customers can do everything online, including identifying the location on a map, track their case and sign up to progress alerts. At the same time we’re able to manage their expectations and set realistic deadlines for resolution.”
API – the key to automation
The project was managed internally by Hillard and the council’s web developer, Jason Lee (pictured below). Using IEG4’s eDesigner, they created the online form and designed a mapping location solution, ReportIT, which was incorporated into the form.
With the new service, customers can go online any time of the day, seven days a week to report fly-tipping. During the reporting process they use a draggable pointer to identify the exact location of the incident.
The solution prevents duplicate reports as it highlights incidents that the council is already aware of, or in the process of dealing with, on the map. A red flag indicates that a report is being investigated, an orange flag that the council is aware of an incident but that it is on private land, and a green flag indicates that the fly-tipping could not be found.
To ensure they have the most accurate information from customers, the forms were deliberately designed to offer mainly drop-down boxes and radio buttons, so that only one option can be selected at any one time.
From a customer perspective the new process worked well. However, introducing ReportIT, the mapping solution, meant that back office staff had yet another system to use and manage, as well as OpenProcess and Idox.
To solve this problem, the team came up with the idea of harnessing the IEG4’s APIs. These enabled them to capture all of the details submitted by the customer and automatically update all the relevant systems.
Staff could then add notes to the information provided, flag the location as private land, or tailor the information in OpenProcess and Idox. Idox then keeps all systems up to date as the process steps are taken to resolve the incident – all the while keeping the customer informed of what is happening. Additional information, such as images sent with the initial report are automatically captured for use in the back office case officer's notes.
Lee explains: “With all solutions in place, the customer goes onto the form, puts a pin on the map to see whether the incident is being dealt with, and if not they can directly report it to the council and track progress. The data is pushed by the API into the ReportIT system and Idox - so everything the customer enters is recorded – automatically, 24/7 and within a matter of minutes.”
An advantage of the APIs is that staff only have to make changes once and the information is automatically updated into the other two systems. Lee says: “The APIs updates all the systems. If, for example, a customer recorded an incident that was on private land not public, the CIC advisor corrects the incident in Idox and the other systems are automatically updated. The process also triggers an update to the customer so that they know what’s going on.”
Legacy systems
Lee explains that Idox, which the council is using, is a traditional, or legacy, system – but that using the IEG4’s APIs have allowed them to ‘join a new service to an old service through a common language’.
“Many legacy systems are deeply entwined in the machinery of the council and it is difficult to change. What the IEG4 APIs allow us to do is to work with these old systems and present a modern interface to our customers. The APIs are generic so they can work with any solution as long as the solution allows you to submit data into it via an API or a connector.
“With council budgets being stretched and as technology innovations move at a pace – this has to be the way forward to make the most of our legacy systems,” says Lee.
Success and next steps
Fly-tipping reporting in King’s Lynn and West Norfolk is now a seamless journey – with the data captured and integrated across all the council’s systems and updated automatically when changes are made.
This has led to impressive results – 100 per cent data accuracy, faster resolution and 83 per cent cost and time saving – with each request now processed in five minutes. This has meant the admin work of one FTE has been saved and their role deployed to do other work.
Hillard says: “Customers would sometimes give us vague instructions and could involve us going back and forth to establish the exact spot. For example, someone would say ‘along the A47’ but the A47 is 192 miles long linking Birmingham to Lowestoft or someone would report an incident in Northgate Way in Terrington St Clement, near the bus stop. Northgate Way is approximately two miles long and has approximately 110 properties and has eight bus stops. Thanks to the new system, we no longer have vague and inaccurate information.”
In addition, it has helped the council to avoid dealing with duplicate incidents as having ‘one record’ allows them to identify whether there’s been more fly-tipping, helping with hotspots and enforcement.
“The reporting mechanism we’ve built means we can see where the hotspots are and we can drill down on data to identity patterns of activity which can lead to further action, for example installing cameras and surveillance. A fly-tipper recently pleaded guilty in court and received a fine totalling nearly £2,300,” says Lee.
Success in the project has led other services across the council to consider adopting the solution. He explains that it took the team three months to implement the service, but to introduce it into another service would take a matter of days.
He says: “The enthusiasm of this project is growing as other services realise what a difference it can make in terms of productivity and improvement of performance. Now we have the framework in place, it can be applied across this council and others.”
And this could mean real financial savings.
“Our figures show that each fly-tipping transaction costs £1.00, instead of £6.50, saving £6,500 a year. While this is not vast sums of money, if other councils did the same across the country, savings could be nearly £2.5million. And this is just on one service.”
IEG4 also love the new mapping system and has worked with the council to make it available to others.
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