How to adopt the ORUK standard

A quick guide to adopting the Open Referral UK data standard

Adopting ORUK: step by step

1. Understand the standard - read a summary of the ORUK data standard to understand the core principles and how they can benefit your organisation
2. Explore use cases - see how other organisations have used ORUK to improve efficiency and better target services
3. Secure support from your senior leadership - use the executive summary to present the benefits to key decision-makers
4. Develop a business case - use our business case guidance, project initiation document template, and benefits calculator to build a strong case for adoption
5. Implement the technical solution. Follow our technical guidance to implement your ORUK API feed. You can do this with your own development team or by using a compliant product
6. Validate your data - use our free service validator tool to check that your data feed meets the ORUK standard
7. Go live - once validated, we will add your data feed to our verified directory. We'll also help you publicise your feed to encourage data reuse and innovation

ORUK is an interchange standard that makes sure people sending and receiving data understand it in a clear, consistent way. To make this happen, data is transferred via an API feed using the ORUK standard as a common 'language' for computer systems to automatically share and keep service information accurate and up-to-date.