Hackney Council, like many others, takes the security of its systems incredibly seriously, yet, in October 2020, it was the target of a professional cyber-attack. Targeting several of its key services and as a safety precaution, Hackney shut down its back-office systems in order to protect its data.
In response, it turned to a selection of well-known and trusted technology partners to provide support in the service areas hit by the crisis.
IEG4 was able to support Hackney Council to quickly design and implement a version of its Revenues and Benefits solution and also provided the council with its ‘Low Code Forms Designer’ solution. Enabling the team at Hackney to build and deploy intelligent online forms quickly and integrate them into existing systems, including payment systems, and to access a vast library of online service forms meant the council could offer its usual high-quality service, without compromising any of its security practices.
Time was of the essence and the initial contract was agreed in November 2020 with the service going live within a matter of weeks.
One of the reasons that IEG4 was able to act so fast and be agile and responsive with the build and implementation was due to the low code nature that the solution is built on. This enabled it to be quickly designed and implemented, without having to rely on complex coding configurations.
Another factor was that it is hosted on a cloud platform, which allowed fast deployment, and solved the issue of not being able to host any solutions on site at the time. There are also long-term benefits for the council when it comes to cloud hosting. It saves the council money investing in their own infrastructure and enables them to challenge common myths around cloud adoption for all services across the council.
The solution also has high levels of automation and as a result can integrate with other major supplier solutions, which was critical to Hackney as it works with a range of suppliers to manage its digital infrastructure.
In parallel, and not affected by the cyber-attack, IEG4 delivered an end-to-end solution for the council’s waste and recycling services.
IEG4 partnered with asset management provider Yotta (now Causeway Technologies) to facilitate data flow between its operatives and back-offices, with the aim of bringing an efficient and effective waste collection service to local residents.
As a result, the council deployed IEG4’s suite of fully integrated citizen-facing applications to assist Hackney’s residents in communicating with the council. The mobile-responsive ‘smart’ forms provided by IEG4 allow residents to make an enquiry, ‘Report a Missed Collection’ and ‘Request a New Container’ and ‘Arrange Assisted Collections’. These digital solutions fit seamlessly with the internal processes integrated by Yotta.
The clear benefit for this project was for the significant proportion of residents in Hackney who transact online. They were able to continue to do so with little disruption. Hackney was able to demonstrate to its residents that it was proactively putting measures in place to not only keep the service running, but to also improve it in the long run. It also meant that rather than having to contact citizens, and explain services had closed, they could continue the service with workarounds.
Where contacting citizens was necessary, to make them aware of changes and ensure that they were using the correct procedures so that their requests were processed as quickly as possible, IEG4 was also able to lend support. As staff were unable to access their back-office systems to access citizen information – IEG4’s online forms portal, enabled by the ‘Low Code Forms Designer’ solution, provided them with a platform to engage with citizens directly to progress service requests.
In the first month after the service went live, over 12,000 forms related to Revenues and Benefits were submitted by citizens. In total, IEG4 – which also provided a Test & Trace digital solution along with Council Tax, Business Rates, Benefits, Landlords and Waste – has received over 100,000 digital service requests by Hackney’s citizens over the past seven months.
Rob DeFelice, Business Development Director, at IEG4 said of the project: “We’re incredibly pleased that we were able to support Hackney Council with this project. Since we started working with them, we have seen them as an exemplary digital innovator, setting a standard of delivering a high standard of care to citizens online. We are proud that our solutions are part of its framework and that our low code ’Council in a box’ approach meant we could get Hackney back up and running in no time.”
Matthew Cain concluded: “The security of our systems is a priority and consistently updating our technology is paramount to that. This solution from IEG4 has not only supported us in our time of need, but it is also creating efficiencies later down the line.
We also know IEG4 is committed to providing accessible solutions, which was another factor in our decision to undertake this work with them, and we have been able to work closely with IEG4 to ensure the findings from our research in this area are incorporated into the product roadmap. So, it feels like a truly collaborative partnership.”
