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Councils slammed for squandering e-resources
Punters not pushed to self-service websites

By Dan Ilett

Published: Tuesday 16 August 2005

Councils are losing money by failing to encourage the public to use online services as people are still opting to contact staff in person, new research has found.

A study from the Society of IT Management (Socitm) claims only one in five people use local authority websites as a result of council promotions.

According to the research, the largest portion of visitors (29 per cent) found council sites via web search engine Google, or by guessing the website address (18.5 per cent). A quarter of survey respondents said they used the website because they worked for the council.

Martin Greenwood, programme manager for Socitm, said in a statement: "We know from the e-citizen national project that there is a whole population out there ready to use council websites, and that getting them to do so will bring tangible benefits in terms of efficiency gains and increased satisfaction with the council.

"However, it seems that councils have to-date invested little in promotion, concentrating perhaps on getting the website right as a facility to offer. Now is the time to change priorities."

Warwickshire County Council claims to have saved £707,727 by encouraging the public to use online self-service facilities.

The study also showed an estimated 11.4 million visitors came to local government websites in May. Local residents were found to be the largest demographic of visitors.

More than 80 per cent of respondents said they found what they were looking for on the council website. Job vacancies were the most frequently cited reason for the visit.