Credit: Environment Agency

The Environment Agency is revamping its digital tool for waste exporters.

The current version (pictured above) is built around an embedded Flash application, which the agency claims “isn't accessible to many modern devices and doesn't meet modern web development standards”. It is also very “very hard to update the database behind the scenes”, it added, meaning that changes to policy often take some time to be reflected on the site.

Niki Wycherley and Adam Wallace, who joined the Environment Agency as apprentices this summer, have been using the Government Digital Service’s Service Toolkit to redesign the website to make it fit for use both internally and externally. The new service – which is currently in alpha – features a simplified front end, which asks users what they want to export and to where, before telling them which controls will apply to them and how to go about fulfilling their obligations.

The back end has also been redesigned, implementing a web form to which agency staff can sign in to alter existing database entries or create new ones.

While the service is not yet in a fit state to pass a Service Assessment, the goal in the coming weeks is to make the necessary improvements for it to do so. 

“This is a terrific example of iterative delivery, and of using the Service Toolkit the way it was designed to be used,” the Environment Agency said.