Transformation strategy

Why we are transforming:                        

· Increased Efficiency Digital solutions have helped Spelthorne streamline processes and automate tasks, reducing the administrative burden and freeing up staff to focus on higher value tasks. For example, the implementation of an online customer portal and the utilisation of digital workflows and e-forms. This leads to significant time savings and increases the efficiency of our operations.

· Cost Savings Adopting digital systems and AI will reduce paperwork, streamline processes, and lower costs. When demand for services decreases, there is less work to be done, which can lead to a reduction in the number of staff needed to handle the workload.

· Better Decision-Making Digital tools can provide local government with real-time data and analytics, enabling better decision making and more targeted interventions. For example, by capturing and analysing data on service usage through tools such as Converse, we will identify areas for improvement, prioritise resources and implement more effective interventions.

· Enhanced Collaboration Digital transformation promotes collaboration between departments and with other local authorities, enabling more joined-up services and better outcomes for residents. For instance, local government can adopt common standards and platforms to improve interoperability between different systems and reduce the duplication of effort.

· Upskilling Staff Spelthorne regularly provides training and development opportunities for staff to build their digital skills and capabilities, ensuring they are equipped to deliver high-quality services. For example, MS Office training and better utilising our business applications such as SharePoint and Teams.

How is it being delivered:

The digital model Spelthorne is delivering is essentially to build an omnichannel platform that offers several advantages over the existing multichannel platform which suffers from being siloed and has scalability issues. The model Spelthorne is working to creates a back-end platform linked to existing applications which is then accessible by the customer through web applications e.g. User portal, web chat, forms etc as illustrated below.

What have we done so far:

· Civic Engagement Portal Spelthorne has consolidated our current customer portals into a single 'Digital-front-door', and by using a single log-in, residents and businesses now have immediate and personalised access to various services on any device, at any time of day. Sign ups have reached 10k within the first year of going live.

· Contact Centre Whether engagement is received by email, web chat or phone, Spelthorne have made the experience as seamless and consistent as possible. By changing our telephone system and provider, we integrated processes and systems where it had previously not been possible; broke down silos; and began flexibly managing all communications interactions internally and externally across the organisation.

· Web chat Spelthorne has implemented a chat bot overlay on our primary webpage to offer visitors prompt responses to their enquiries or information needs. This approach enables our staff to focus on addressing more complex queries and high-impact areas such as recovery and collection, ultimately improving efficiency and productivity. Web chat usage has increased by 108% in the last year.

· Printing & postage Spelthorne has chosen to outsource certain printing and postage requirements to a third party which send around 100,000 items a year on the Council’s behalf at a greatly reduced cost to ending it ourselves. There is also a considerable staff time saving from this activity. Our goal is to reduce our existing postage costs by as much as 85%

· Automation we have introduced the automatic processing of certain (high volume) Council Tax applications. This automation will free up staff currently engaged in the manual processing of day-to-day Council Tax changes and enable the redeployment or reduction of resources. Our target is to automate 70% of forms received. This target is below what is being achieved by other authorities who have reached between 80% - 90%.

· Continuous improvement During this review, the Root and Branch project team identified 307 improvements across all services and were able to deliver 73% of them through short- and long-term projects. The remaining improvements were able to be delivered outside of a formal project or without ongoing support from the project team. The improvements identified through this programme equated to approximately £214k in staff time savings.