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Councils across the United Kingdom are failing to grasp the importance of digital delivery and, as a consequence, are not delivering convenient and value for money services to their residents, a new report claims.

Just nine of the 433 councils were awarded the top ranking of four stars in Better Connected, the annual survey of council websites by Socitm, a membership association for IT professionals in local authorities.

But 68 per cent of councils failed to achieve more than two stars as they failed to grasp the importance of their online communications channel.

The survey, which analyses six of the 12 most used parts of a typical council website, found that more than one in five visits (22 per cent) last year ended in complete failure for the user. 

It considered whether users would find up-to-date information on the websites or, indeed, whether the content might be of interest. Ease of navigation, comprehensive search tools and accessibility for disabled users were also analysed, along with the ability of customers to conduct business online or connect via email.

Socitm found, however, that fewer than four in ten council websites contained up-to-date information, a deterioration of 22 percentage points on the year, while 51 per cent (up 13 percentage points) allowed users to pay bills online. Just two per cent of council websites could be relied upon to be resilient and working properly at all times.

Socitm recommends that councils re-evaluate their website performance and focus on three interconnected themes - think customer, focus on 'top tasks' and go mobile.

It claims that websites should be seen as a broader part of managing customer access for councils and that web teams should view customer service as their primary goal. If the performance of council websites is to improve, councils must reduce the number of visits that prove fruitless for users by recognising that the more the site is used for any one task, then the more important it is to make that task quick and easy to use.

The top nine councils were Brighton & Hove, Bristol City, East Sussex, Eden, City of Edinburgh, Lewisham, Richmond upon Thames, Salford City and Surrey Heath.

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