Archived decisions
3. Background
3.1 "Hantsdirect", the County Council's new customer contact centre, is intended to provide a clear and easy way for people in Hampshire to contact the County Council by telephone and email, and have an immediate response to their questions and requests. A dedicated team will be trained to answer questions and facilitate services so that a high proportion of queries can be answered in the first call. If not, then callers will be passed on to specialists who will be able to help them.
3.2 The County Council currently publishes over 200 telephone numbers and receives over two million telephone calls per year from the public. It is not always clear to people which of the 200 numbers they should ring for services. Hantsdirect is intended to simplify this process.
3.3 The hours during which the County Council is contactable by telephone will be extended, as Hantsdirect will be open from 8am to 8pm on weekdays, and slightly shorter hours on Saturdays and bank holidays. A 24/7 out of hours service will be available for social care services.
3.4 On 19 December 2005, Cabinet gave approval to the implementation of the Contact Centre in accordance with the strategy, approach and business case set out in a report of the Director of PBRS/Chairman of the Contact Centre Board. Initial capital investment of £4.84m was required. This was to be funded from capital receipts. The annual operating cost of £2.97m compared to an estimated annual cost of call handling of £4m. This meant that, in addition to benefits of improved customer service, the project delivered an annual efficiency saving of £1.03m.
3.5 Implementation of this major corporate project is now understood to be slightly behind schedule after the first phase of transferring services from departments. Any delay continuing into the transfer of departments included in the second phase ( the largest volume ) will probably affect the budgets of those departments because they have already seen reductions in funding to cover the revenue costs of the project. The expected savings in resources may not be available and a risk of overspending therefore arises unless costs can be contained. Delays may also mean that re-engineering of processes by departments are also deferred and planned efficiency gains replaced by budget cuts. It was further noted that, at the time of writing, the important post of Head of Customer Services was still vacant and being covered in part by an external consultant, although an appointment has been made and was due to start on 1st September 2007.