![]() |
Best Practice Website Assessments |
|
| About Us | Services | Evaluation Criteria | Contact Us |
The services of e-Gov Watch are concerned with the quality assessment of government websites. They comprise:
Our Assessment Process:
The
Full Website Assessment includes the web guidelines assessment and is
focused on whether users are able to access the information and
services they require quickly and easily. It covers the full
e-Gov Watch criteria including information and service delivery and
consultation and cross organisation integration. It is the most
cost effective review for many organisations.
Any issues
identified through the Assessment will have comments and example web
pages to enable you as an organisation to improve your site. A
scoring for compliance with the Government Web Standards &
Recommendations is included within this assessment. The site being
assessed is rated against all the reviews completed so the government
agency is aware of how their performance compares to other government
agencies. Where the site rates in the top 10 of
government sites or the top 10 in any criteria the results are
published on this site every two months.
The Compliance Advice Report prioritises and describes the top 50 issues identified during the Full Website Assessment. For each issue we outline the severity of the problem, the implications to users and remedial action recommended. The benefits to agencies of this report are the transparent identification of the key issues for online delivery improvement and the cost-effectiveness of the resulting advice. This report also includes a section for non-technical people and is aimed at the strategically important issues facing the particular website.
The New Zealand Government Web Standards and Recommendations v2.0 applies to any web site that is intended for the public and financed by the public through the Crown or through public agencies. Some organisations may wish to be assessed only against this minimum standard. This assessment identified all issues preventing full compliance with the Standards are identified for resolution, with comments and examples. It covers both Required Government Content and Accessibility.
This report prioritises and describes the issues found during the website assessment. It includes description of the specific issues found, what the implications of the issues are and how to fix them.
This is a review of the structural elements of a site for Accessibility and Usability and is typically conducted relatively early in the website development before most site content is published. This allows action to be taken before the structural elements are set in place.
If an agency wants to make changes following a Website Assessment and has tracked the changes against the original Assessment we can re-review the site against the changes made. This is a low cost service offered to existing clients to enable them to review and refine their site and reflect these changes in their ratings.
To inquire about any of these services or pricing for your website, please contact us.
E-Gov Watch's main offering is the quality assessment of government websites against its comprehensive set of best government online practices criteria. The assessment criteria are wide ranging and apply to all government sites.
The criteria are grouped into the following nine criteria areas;
| Criteria Areas | No. of Criteria Elements | Source of Criteria |
| Required Government Content | 39 criteria | Government Web Standards & Recommendations, version 2.0 |
| Accessibility | 78 criteria | Government Web Standards & Recommendations, version 2.0 |
| Usability | 136 criteria | Best practices in website usability applicable to e-government |
| Information Delivery | 13 criteria for each Information Item (typically 5 to 15 Information Items per website) | Information
Items from planning documents, websites of comparable
organisations, Estimates of Appropriations plus website content |
| e-Services Delivery | 16 criteria for each e-Service (typically 0 to 12 e-Services per website) | Service
Items from planning documents, websites of comparable
organisations, Estimates of Appropriations plus website content |
| Personalisation | 20 criteria | Best practices in personalisation applicable to e-government |
| Cross-Organisation Integration | 14 criteria | Best practices in cross-organisation integration applicable to e-government |
| Feedback | 6 criteria | Best practices in feedback applicable to e-government |
| e-Consultation | 31 criteria for each consultation offered in the last year | Best e-government practices in e-consultation |
Expert assessors evaluate the website assessed, rate the site on a 0 to 10 scale against each of the criteria and add comments and links to examples of issues where relevant. Each of the criteria is weighted for importance. The combination of ratings and weightings are summed up to a score out of 100 for each criteria area.
Each criteria area is also weighted for importance relative to the type of government organisation. For example, policy agencies may not have significant scope for e-services delivery but a greater need for e-consultation.
Government organisations with multiple websites can get each site assessed individually as well as an aggregate overall rating for comparison with other organisations.
The criteria, ratings, comments and weightings are delivered in the form of an Excel workbook with separate worksheets for each criteria area and a summary page. This digital format allows clients to see the calculations clearly and to follow the example web links back to the source of issues found. Each worksheet is also formatted for printing.
Full assessments typically take five working days to complete with faster reviews available upon discussion.
An e-Gov Watch assessment generally takes between 7 working days depending on the complexity of the site. The steps in the assessment process are:
The benefits of an e-Gov Watch website assessment are;
The best times to get an e-Gov Watch website assessment are;
To support or justify the redevelopment of a website, in the sense of an independent review creating a case for change
During a major redevelopment to check the quality of the site and allowing the opportunity to remedy any issues found (especially during an external developerâ??s warrantee period)
At any time to establish a regular benchmark of improvement
We are beginning to offer our services internationally. We tailor our criteria to the local government criteria available in each country and to suit different types of government agencies be they federal, state or local organisation. We also tailor our criteria to the type of organisation for example whether they are policy or service delivery organisations. We will tailor our criteria to meet your type of organisation while at the same time maintaining integrity within our criteria to enable cross organisational comparison.
The prices for assessments and related services for individual websites are;
| e-Gov Watch Services | Price per site* (excl GST) |
| Full Website Assessment | $4,500 |
| Compliance Advice Report - Full Assessment | $2,000 |
| Supplementary Website Assessment | Depends upon the extent of changes made |
| Government Web Standards & Recommendations Assessment | $2,000 |
| Compliance Advice Report - Government Web Standards & Recommendations Assessment | $1,000 |
* All prices are based on websites of 'normal' size and complexity.
Very large or complex sites may be subject to an additional cost on a
case by case basis. Similarly, very small sites may be eligible
for a discounted price. Assessments of multiple sites are also
eligible for discounted rates. Please contact us to discuss pricing options.
All enquiries for countries outside New Zealand should contact us to enquire about relevant pricing and assessment standards.