City and municipal utilities have a new website
23.05.2022
The city and the municipal utilities have a new website. The new site looks different and has new technologies.
The Lord Mayor Dr. Felix Schwenkte is delighted. He says: "The Internet is changing fast. Today, people visit the website using a cell phone, for example. But the law has also changed. A website must be accessible. This means that everyone must be able to read it. People who cannot see do this with a program. This program is called a "screen reader". In German, the word means screen reader. Data protection is also different today. Data protection protects internet users.
Since 2015, people have been able to read the website of the city and the municipal utilities with a cell phone. The new website has been further improved. It has a simple "burger menu". These are the three lines at the top right of the website. If you click on them, the menu opens and you can see all the topics that can be found there.
The website also works like an app. An app is a program for cell phones. If you want, you can save the website to your own cell phone or computer. A small icon then appears on the screen. When you click on the icon, the new website opens. This technology is called "Progressive Web App", also known as "PWA".
If you want, you can also subscribe to important news from the city via the Internet. These are called "push messages". The messages then appear in the "browser". The "browser" is a program used to open a website on the Internet. For example, there are messages about dangers or an emergency.
Regina Preis and Fabian El-Cheikh run the Offenbacher Stadtmarketinggesellschaft company. This company makes the website for the city and the municipal utilities. They say: "We check how many people visit the website and which programs they use. That way we can continue to improve the website.
They also say: "We want to inform people in different ways. For example, via our website, via push messages, via e-mail and via the Facebook and Twitter pages. We want to send the news to the people of Offenbach in the way they prefer to read it.
Find contact and service easily
The new website has a simple structure. At www.offenbach.de there is a link "Online services". If you click on the word with the mouse button, you will find all the forms that you can fill in and send on the Internet. There is also a link "Town Hall A-Z". If you click on the word with the mouse button, you will find all the important contacts. For example, the immigration office or the citizens' office. There is also important news from Offenbach at www.offenbach.de.
There are four topics in the "Burger Menu": Citizens, Guests, Companies and Press. Under Citizens you will also find all the forms and services of the city and municipal utilities and information on important topics.
The city and municipal utilities spent a year working on the new website. They did this together with the company Sitepark. That is a very short time. The website has over 10,000 pages. That's a lot. There may still be errors. These errors will be corrected quickly.