Success Story | Aberdeen City Council
How a City Processes Parking Permits 63% Faster with govService
Aberdeen is a city in Scotland with a population of 196,000. Recent Scottish legislature expanded the number of people eligible to receive handicap parking permits. Now met with 260 applications monthly, Aberdeen staff were inundated. City leaders turned to their already successful partnership with Granicus govService for help.
SITUATION
Like many other cities, Aberdeen was using an outside technology vendor to assist with handicap parking permit applications. But the City’s process still required residents to fill out a paper form to apply for a permit. Staff then scanned, emailed, and retyped the forms into an electronic system. They used a separate spreadsheet to track the status of each application.
Applicants for the parking permit were unable to upload files or the required proof of disability. Instead, applicants would need to mail in the documents separately.
Recent legislature expanded the number of people eligible to receive handicap parking permits. The backlog of applications quickly grew unmanageable. With the goal of reducing their backlog from 12 weeks to 4 weeks, City staff needed to change their processes quickly.
SOLUTION
Aberdeen had tight time and budget requirements for the parking permit application, so they turned to Granicus for help. Granicus had previously partnered with Aberdeen to develop 125 custom online forms in govService. For this project, Aberdeen found their solution in a premium pre-built form from the govService MyServices library. With best practices and user experiences central to its design, the Handicap Parking Permit MyService is an end-to-end solution that enables a fully digital application process.
It offers customers tailored advice at each point of contact, from checking eligibility for the permit to taking payment. Simultaneously, it provides a simple back-office workflow to process applications. The whole application can be completed online.
Users who have previously signed up for an account with Aberdeen City Council see their profile information automatically populate the application for a smooth user experience. Information is retained as users move through the form to avoid repeating questions. Users can check the status of their application and complete any extra stages at any time by logging into their account.
RESULTS
Previously, one staff member spent five hours a week checking an applicant’s eligibility for a permit, while an occupational therapist spent almost eight hours a week processing paper forms and chasing any information missed in the original paper application. With govService’s ability to confirm eligibility before an application is submitted, paper processing has become unnecessary. Staff are now free to focus on other work, recovering 13 hours of staff time weekly.
The fresh, intuitive system makes training easy. Long-time staff members received training to make the transition from the old system to govService painless. New staff can hit the ground running as well.
Lastly, govService MyService forms are periodically updated with feedback and kept in accordance with Department for Transport requirements. Aberdeen staff save initial development time if another law passes and time required to maintain the process.
