Dying is Going Digital At The DWP

The Department for Work and Pensions has made improvements to its bereavement service, with the aim of helping its staff process information from citizens.
 
The 'Capture information about a death' service has been created for telephone operators receiving calls from citizens who wish to discuss the benefits of someone who has recently died. The platform has been designed to help call-centre agents to input information from callers and advise them on what financial assistance might be available to them.

Delivery manager Annika Vaid and product owner Dave Hardy revealed that the tool was developed using a model-office testing method – which aims to test a service in conditions as close to real life as possible.

And:

The government is to spend about £1.25m on building a digital tool for doctors to report deaths.

Doctors across England and Wales are required to inform their local medical examiners’ office of all deaths they record. These examiners, who then scrutinise and confirm the recorded cause of death, were introduced as part of reforms that came in light of the Harold Shipman case, which were designed to provide more safeguards and greater transparency in the death-reporting system.

Currently, doctors must inform examiners of newly recorded deaths via phone, email, or in person. The examiner than has five days to complete a process that is based on paper and the Microsoft Access database tool.

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