Issue - meetings

Claire McLoughlin and Tanya Palmowski, Corporate Improvement Officers, presented a progress report to date on the above project which had now reached implementation stage.

E-Marketplace was now known across all authorities as Connect to Support (CtS).  Rotherham, being 1 of the mid-implementers, was a leader in the development of CtS and it was important that it continued as a national leader in the innovative initiative.

The project was now at implementation stage in Rotherham.  There were several separate elements to implementation – ‘sign off’, establishing the basic system and ‘going live’ including the date for ‘soft launch’ and the date for the public launch.  There were some significant challenges the Council would face in taking the project forward which would need addressing during implementation.

In preparation for ‘sign off’, a strategy would be development containing details of process change, changes to existing ways of working, impact on each stakeholder including obtaining stakeholder buy-in, technology including basic system functionality, implications such as accreditation and performance management.  The Strategy was to be signed off on 18^th May.  The basic system functions would then be tested with input from staff, providers and customers alongside Shop4Support (s4s) who won the tendering process. 

Each local authority only had a 2 month window of concentrated support from s4s (which had already started) to establish the site, soft launch and agree sign off of the basic system.  Failure to engage with s4s could impact on the regional schedule if Rotherham needed to be moved back in the implementation timeline. 

Dates of the soft launch and public launch would be agreed following completion of the implementation phase.

Discussion ensued on the report with the following issues discussed/highlighted:-

-        It provided customers with another avenue of finding out what services were available/what was happening in the community without coming via the Adult Care Service

-        As part of the accreditation process agreement needed as to who would be allowed on Rotherham’s website but could not control other authorities’ sites.  There was the opportunity to manage the content and remove providers if felt not performing to certain standards

-        Needed to decide, as part of the accreditation, what that process should be.  Some authorities allowed any one on their site with the Caveat Emptor approach

-        Customers would be able to rate services and leave feedback

-        Initially s4s would be managing the process but then the Authority would have to identify resources.  A risk analysis would be carried out and presented to NAS DLT

-        The development of the site was cost neutral due to funding provided regionally through the Y&H JIP – resources required for day-to-day content management, systems administrator etc.

-        Discussions with Legal Services to ascertain whether, as part of the accreditation process, it could be stated if providers had not met parts of the accreditation e.g. some providers may not have been successful in retendering on price not quality

-        A 2.5% transaction fee would be charged  ...  view the full minutes text for item 61