Awarded to Criteria Fieldwork Ltd

Start date: Tuesday 5 December 2017
Value: £74,687
Company size: SME
Government Digital Service, part of Cabinet Office

WP1430 User Research for GOV.UK Verify

1 Incomplete application

1 SME, 0 large

3 Completed applications

3 SME, 0 large

Important dates

Published
Monday 2 October 2017
Deadline for asking questions
Monday 9 October 2017 at 11:59pm GMT
Closing date for applications
Monday 16 October 2017 at 11:59pm GMT

Overview

Summary of the work
Providing research participants for user research for GOV.UK Verify.
Location
London
Research dates
November 2017 until November 2018
Organisation the work is for
Government Digital Service, part of Cabinet Office
Budget range
up to 75k

About the work

Early market engagement
None

About the research

Description of your participants
The following provides a general overview of our criteria. The supplier must demonstrate their ability to provide participants that meet this criteria: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-264nLyB1zdVHlWbEhoNm9WcFk/view?usp=sharing
Assisted digital and accessibility requirements
Accessibility research - including one user per week (i.e. 1 in 6) with a disability. We will require one participant with one of the following kinds of disability:
- severe visual impairment (i.e. user of screen reading software)
- moderate visual impairment (i.e. user of screen magnifying software)
- mild visual impairment
- severe dyslexia
- deafness
- mild motor impairment (e.g. rheumatoid arthritis that affects ability to use computers)
- moderate motor impairment (e.g. use of one hand)
- colour blindness
- Autistic spectrum
- mental health conditions

The attached overview provides further details: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-264nLyB1zdVHlWbEhoNm9WcFk/view?usp=sharing
Research plan
We are running multiple projects across a programme of work, each with roughly 2 week testing cycles for which these participants will be required. The number of concurrent projects running at any one point will likely change cross the year and there will likely be ad-hoc testing requirements
Research location
Normally the White Chapel Building, Whitechapel High Street, London, but occasionally other locations across UK
Access restrictions at location
n/a
Number of research rounds
approximately 60-75
Number of participants per round
It is usually 6 participants per round but we would like to have the flexibility to occasionally ask for more.

Spare participants - on a case by case basis but usually not required
How often research will happen
The research will take place at least every two weeks and probably more frequently at some times. At least 2 weeks notice of requirements will be given, although it will be necessary at some times for the supplier to provide participants with less notice than that.
Evening or weekend research

Additional information

Additional terms and conditions
All vendors are obliged to provide sufficient guarantees to implement appropriate technical and organisational measures so that the processing meets the requirements of GDPR and ensures the protection of the rights of data subjects. For further information please see the Information Commissioner's Office website:https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/data-protection-reform/overview-of-the-gdpr/

Skills and experience

Buyers will use the essential and nice-to-have skills and experience to help them evaluate suppliers’ technical competence.

Essential skills and experience
  • We would require you to create the screener for recruiting participants based on our criteria, and to maintain this for the duration of the engagement.
  • We will require you to provide incentives for the participants, by BACS only, not by cash.
  • Flexibility to occasionally increase/decrease respondents (from 6 per round) or number of days. Changes would be discussed in advance. We expect to be charged on a pro rata basis.
  • Timely recruitment of research participants in accordance with specified characteristics, even when these characteristics are challenging.
  • We may require recruitment of non-British EU citizens who are resident in the UK. Sometimes specific nationalities in addition to requirements for people who’ve been in UK for specific timeframes.
  • We may sometimes require multiple concurrent recruits and this will need to be supported
Nice-to-have skills and experience
Ability to provide replacement participants at short notice should someone drop out

How suppliers will be evaluated

How many suppliers to evaluate
3
Proposal criteria
Assessment methods
  • Written proposal
  • Case study
  • Reference
  • Interview
Evaluation weighting

Technical competence

65%

Availability

15%

Price

20%

Questions asked by suppliers

1. Would paying participants by cheque be a payment option?
No - we don't think participants would be happy with it
2. The overview document refers to “the course of the 8 sessions”. Is this an error? How does it relate to the figure of 60 to 75 research rounds?
Yes - this is an error please ignore this
3. Does the budget of up to £75k include incentive payments?
Yes
4. The overview document states “Participants must not be recruited online”. Is it acceptable to canvas for participants in online forums as long as any responses are followed by a telephone interview or face-to-face meeting?
It is acceptable to recruit some participants this way in cases where we are looking for people with high digital confidence, but recruiters must have a good ability to recruit people who have limited or no access to digital devices and the internet, or limited or no digital skills. Any online recruitment path must be accessible.
5. Does your UX lab facility have all the assistive technologies that disabled participants will require, such as screen readers, screen magnifiers and voice recognition software?
We expect participants to bring their own assistive technology to a usability session in our lab. This is because assistive technology setup is highly personal. If a participant is not able to come to our lab or bring their assistive tech, then we would expect to visit them at their home or workplace.