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CHEFS is moving to Citizen Services
  • In progress

    • CHEFS is moving to Citizen Services

    Owned by Jordan Reed (Deactivated)
    Last updated: Sept 08, 2022
    3 min read

    As of Thursday September 8, 2022, Common Hosted Form Service (CHEFS), which was developed and supported by a team within the Natural Resource Ministries, will be supported by a product development team working in the Exchange Lab, a branch of the Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO). CHEFS has become a prevailing solution for creating and publishing secure forms with a simple workflow for receiving online submissions. The Ministry of Citizens Services is ready to formally support CHEFS as an official solution for use in BC government. Transferring accountability and ownership to a cross-government dedicated team will bring long-term stability and expand business capabilities for forms and submissions across the province. We are executing a strategy for a smooth transition that ensures users experience no disruption to their stored data, published forms and submissions workflow. This means that all existing users can continue to use CHEFS as usual throughout the brief transition period.

     

    No action is required on your part at this time!

     

    What are the benefits?

    A dedicated product development team expanding support for CHEFS across government

    More corporate resources for continued operational stability as a BC Government service

     

    FAQ

     

    The current team that develops and maintains CHEFS is handing it over to a new team who is in a position to give more support for users outside the natural resources ministries. The NRM Showcase team has done an amazing job developing CHEFS and supporting its users. While focused on needs of their colleagues in the natural resources sector, they were able to bring value to CHEFS for users in other areas of government too. Now the time has come to scale CHEFS into a widely adopted provincial solution. The new Forms and Submissions team looks forward to carrying the torch on September 8, 2022, working closely with users to develop new capabilities, and provide ongoing support.

     

    Branding and corporate ownership of CHEFS will be changing from the Natural Resources sector to the Ministry of Citizens Services and Exchange Lab branch of the OCIO. This will include changing to a new URL and web domain. Through the transition period, and until January 2023, the existing CHEFS URL and web domain, including links to published forms, will automatically redirect to a new URL and web domains. This will provide teams several months to update and change any links to their forms.

     

    Some changes to administration and technical infrastructure will take place. We anticipate no impact to user experience. However, if an impact is identified, we will promptly communicate with forms owners about what they might expect, so that we can mitigate any disruptions to their workflow. The NRM team has partnered with the Forms and Submissions team as necessary to ensure this.

     

    At this time, there is no action required for forms owners. Existing workflow for using CHEFS will remain the same. There will be no disruption to stored data or published forms. This means that all users can continue to use CHEFS as usual throughout the brief transition period. In the coming months forms owners will be required to update and change any links to their forms.

     

    With a dedicated team focused on delivering more capabilities, you can expect meaningful improvements to your workflow. The team will be regularly reaching out through various user research activities, building on the work done by the previous team in this area, to understand your needs and challenges so that they can provide the best forms and submissions experience possible. You can also expect more corporate resources that ensure long-term product stability and ongoing user support.

     

     

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