How we work…

1. The first step to commissioning design is to contact communications or design to discuss your requirements with them and decide on the best approach. Points to consider are planning, deadlines and understanding how your requirements will adhere to the Council’s corporate brand. Please also ensure you have considered all equalities accessibility criteria.

2. Clients must complete an online request form. The information on this form is vital, and if not filled in correctly, will cause delays to client jobs. It is particularly important to provide the correct cost code so that your job can be recharged correctly. If you do not supply accurate information, design and print cannot be held responsible. Supplying incorrect or information, or information that has not been agreed by all stakeholders can incur additional costs.

3. Once a designer has been assigned a job, they will speak to clients directly to discuss the requirements. This can take up to 48 hours depending on workloads.

4. A set of proofs (usually up to 2 or 3) is provided to clients to check that the information provided has been designed and included to client’s satisfaction. Please note that clients are responsible for checking and circulating proofs to senior managers and members who may need to approve your information.

5. Once you, your line managers and communications have agreed that everything is factually correct, we require an email from you authorising us to send the job to print. Whilst every effort is made to ensure the product meets your specifications, the Design team CANNOT accept responsibility for any errors or omissions by the client. Larger jobs will have a printer’s proof that will allow you a final opportunity to ensure all information is accurate. This will need to be signed and sent back to the print team.
   

Costs…

1. Design charges are £65 per hour. Our team works in 15-minute segments that work out to £16.25 per segment. The hourly rate includes client meetings, admin, production and any proofing of printers proofs.

2. It should be noted that reprinting work would still incur a minimum 30-minute charge, as we need to access our archive and send to clients and print. We have a single hourly rate in order to make financial account as easy as possible and be transparent with our charging.

3. Each PDF proof [not email] you receive should provide a cost to date included.

Text

Signed off text is essential from the outset in order to keep costs down. Once we have transferred your text Google or Word you will not be able to edit publicity without a designer updating that text in our design packages. Always make sure that your managers; heads of services; politicians and directors have approved the text before sending it to us. Communications will be able to advise you on using plain English in you publicity and marketing material.

Images and Logos

It is essential that we have images supplied to us in the correct resolution. This will ensure that your work looks professional and represents your service standards. All images supplied to design must be a minimum of 300dpi. All logos must either be high-resolution images, or a vector based file. Adobe illustrator is a vector file. If you are unsure please contact the design team for advise. If the design team need to source images for you, the normal hourly rate applies.

If you’re planning to work on a larger project for print or web consumption, an Enhanced Licence will need to be purchased at an additional cost of £125. For example: merchandise for promotional use, within templates and print runs that exceed 500,000. To discuss further contact: designrequests@hackney.gov.uk.

Print

All print must be ordered through the Hackney Print Service. This is the council’s policy and it is recommended that you contact Print should you have any discrepancies, concerns or suggestions. We have a number of preferred contracted printers, which work with us and adhere to the various Service Level Agreement’s that print have set down for them. These include environment, financial and time issues.

To contact the print team directly please email: print.requests@hackney.gov.uk

Merchandise

Merchandise can be procured through Design via the print department. You should always factor in a six weeks turn around for most merchandise items, which means you must incorporate this time into your planning. All merchandise will need approval from the communications team before being ordered.

Deadlines

When planning any publicity work you will need to ensure you have sufficient time for print to complete and deliver your work on time. This is especially important, as whilst print will endeavour to meet all deadlines, if they do not have the correct amount of time to complete work, they cannot guarantee delivery on time.

It is also against Council Policy for staff to use design tools to create communications or publicity materials on behalf of the council without express permission from the Communications team - this also applies to the online design tool, Canva.

Canva terms of use

With permission staff can use the online design tool however Canva for Hackney Teams guidance must be followed. Please refer to this guidance document for details on access, use cases, and permissions for teams across the council. 

Bespoke Canva templates can be requested, professionally designed, and shared with teams through the Design Team using this Creative Brief Form.