The dopomoha.ro web platform was launched in 2022 as a response to the refugee crisis following the Ukraine war. The basis for the platform is the RVM app and its corresponding platform, launched in 2020 (see information about the RVM app i the Catalogue of solutions). The Dopomoha website is a portal for both providing and requesting resources. The Romanian Department of Emergency Services of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (DSU) deploys available resources.
The platform landing page displays six buttons, through which the user can navigate between the different information categories. By clicking 'Legal status', the user of the website is provided with information about protection, short stays, rights, and how to apply for asylum. 'Info' takes you to frequently asked questions and answers. 'Stay safe' gives guidlines to refugees on how to avoid human trafficking and exploitation. 'Support' takes you to a page with different options. If you are a refugee you are here provided with information about for example how to request financial assistance, where to ask for medical assistance, and you can register your need for housing, legal help, and transport. In addition, 'Support' is directed to volunteers who wants to help, and provides a way to register help with food, products, clothing, or transportation. With the fifth button, 'Housing', the user of the website is provided with two options - you can either ask for accomodation, or you can offer accomodation. The last button, 'Call centre', takes you to a page with an overview of help lines and telephone numbers to medical support.
When it comes to resources that are offered, such as transport and housing, everything is checked and verified, both the people providing help and what they offer as resources. In the beginning of the war, housing was a priority and legal aspects was a significant aspect. The DSU can view all the housings (all have been verified), and can follow up on refugees to see where they are and that they are safe. Refugees are offered public spaces first, such as hotels. When public spaces are full, refugees have been allocated to private homes.
All requests and offers, in addition to communication, are done through web platforms or other types of digital systems. Accordingly, there needs to be a certain degree of digital literacy in order to make use of the platform.
Close collaboration between government and NGOs is needed, and communication channels with the possibility of involving up to 1000 members needs to be established.
To increase the awareness of the platform and geographical coverage, it may be in order to spend some resources to plan marketing efforts. This will depend on the outreach possibilities of the solution provider in question and the need for marketing. If broader segments of the public are familiar with the platform, it will likely increase the platform's resources in handling different crises.
There needs to be a well-functioning collaboration between authorities and NGOs in order to organise and coordinate all the requests and people who offers to help.
All requests and offers, in addition to communication, are done through web platforms or other types of digital systems. Therefore, the use of the platform requires a certain degree of digital literacy. At the same time, the Dopomoha platform has been developed with the user in mind, making it intuitive and easy to use.
In order to increase the awareness of the platform among citizens and other target groups (i.e., here refugees), marketing activities can make the platform more visible and effective.
Since 2020, NGOs have been uploading data in the RVM app to be used by the Department of Emergency Services (DSU). Information from Chief Security Officers and other users of the app was being gathered in order to release a 2.0. version of the RVM app. In the meantime, the Ukraine war began, and the refugee crisis was a fact. In this situation, there was a need to gather and collect all available resources from private companies and (unorganised) volunteers, not only NGOs. Thus, further development of the original RVM platform was needed. The urgency of the Ukraine war necessitated a separate development to handle requests outside NGOs, however the databases need to communicate with each other. Two new modules were released within less than two weeks. There is now one unique access point for all involved parties (NGOs, public authority, citizens).
The functionality of the platform has been continuously evaluated through feedback from users. Feedback has been given from the ground workers to the DSU of what the needs are, for example now there is a need for clothes and medicines. Feedback has also been related to the need to diversify and how to integrate new features. for example a separate category for tents is needed, not only the category "housing".
A team with tech support for using the app work 24/7 answering telephone and providing support via Microsoft Teams has been established. Some users will always have challenges using such a platform, even though developers always pay attention to accessibility and work with the least technically savvy people as a point of departure.
The Department of Emergency Services wanted to identify volunteers and know who they are, not only see the number of volunteers in an NGO. One person could be part of several organisations, and it would look like you have 30 volunteers, but it might be the same persons. However, identification of individuals is personal data. This was solved by letting only emergency police at state level see the volunteers available. The management of personal data will be done by the organisations themselves, including registering volunteers.
There has been challenges with people offering resources who do not have the best of intentions. Developers have added a location interface consisting of a very long page of terms and conditions. This is done in an attempt to discourage such people. This feature might be bypassed, but regular citizens would be discouraged by it. Moreover, the Dopomoha platform has a dedicated site with guidelines for how to stay safe and emergency numbers, which is easily accessible from the Dopomoha landing page.
There have been some unfortunate events related to discrimination, for example people with dark skin who has not been allowed housing while standing on the doorstep of the house.