Local authorities link to offer joined-up services via CRM

Local authorities in the UK are sharing CRM investments to drive cost-cutting, share customer data across authority
boundaries, and target local services jointly at citizens, CMC can exclusively report.

The uptake of CRM technologies across UK local authorities for Citizen Relationship Marketing continued apace
this week with the announcement that Surrey Heath District Council is the latest to deploy Lagan's CRM software and
intends to use the technology to support the Council's move towards shared service delivery with neighbouring authorities in the area, including the police and healthcare.

"CRM was identified as the tool to create a consolidated service centre. By identifying customers in one place, whether the contact is about missed bins or a benefits claim, Surrey Heath can deliver seamless services to the Council residents," said Richard Payne, Head of CRM, for Surrey Heath District Council.

The council says that the introduction of CRM has enabled an overhaul of back-end processes to introduce further service
improvements, and plans to have included all its customer-facing services within the CRM infrastructure by February 2007.

At the same time the council is working with its local partners, including neighbouring Hart District Council, the Police, the NHS, Surrey County Council, and local disability groups to assess opportunities for closer collaboration.

Payne said: "Hart Council is currently deploying Lagan's CRM solution which provides both Councils with a real pportunity to leverage a shared services infrastructure to reduce costs."

Crucially, Surrey Heath has implemented a solution that can support both immediate and long-term public sector goals, and is the same system being used by a number of other local authorities across the UK.

For example, three local authorities in Northamptonshire have signed an £800,000 joint deal with Lagan. Northampton Borough Council, Daventry DistrictCouncil and Corby Borough Council worked together on procuring the system, and will also share services to citizens.

While the initial implementation of the Lagan solution in Northhamptonshire will focus on achieving specific service and efficiency improvements, like its companion initiative in Surrey, it will pave the way for increasing numbers of inter-authority shared services.

As in Surrey, these initiatives could open the door to a partnership extending beyond the authorities themselves into other public services such as the the PCT (Primary Care Trust) and the Police.

However, as CMC exclusively reported three weeks ago, central government is sponsoring research into the use of CRM nationally to not only offer shared service delivery and cost reductions, but also potentially to identify 'expensive' citizens with a view to perhaps wthdrawing services from them.

It is conceivable that this is the real impetus behind a national ID scheme to draw all of the separate strands of information about citizens together into an overarching database of citizens financial transactions with government and beyond.

With local authorities already embarked on shared schemes on a local level to offer consolidated services, including health and police, across authority boundaries, there would seem to be a willingness among many administrative centres to accept such a scheme nationally.