Southend-on-Sea Borough Council, ConSol-ePlus solution

The Council contacted a software house called AMP, which was later incorporated into Fujitsu. "We provided a specification, we spent some time with the programmers and we ended up with a system that worked for us" said Elaine Clifton. That system was called ConSol. "In the 14 years since then the system's been enhanced, for example, we had a huge update for Y2K; and other users have requested modifications that are available as options. However, we find that we use ConSol now in the same way that we did originally and it is as useful today as it was back then."

The Challenge

Southend-on-Sea Borough Council spends around £365 million a year and employs some 5,600 staff in order to serve the needs of its 160,000 citizens. One of its key aims is the provision of good quality housing and in October 2005 South Essex Homes was formed as an Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMO) to provide the housing service and bring all of its 6,300 houses up to the Government's Decent Homes Standard.

Richard Gormley, Director of Operations, South Essex Homes, comments, “Southend-on-Sea Borough Council commissioned significant investment in the Repairs Service, because it was recognised that a step change was needed to advance service delivery to a much stronger position. As part of that process the Council also realised it needed to enhance the tools available to manage and maintain its homes effectively, including the allocation of work to the wide range of tradesman on call, including plumbers, electricians and carpenters.”

The Solution

Southend-on-Sea Borough Council chose to migrate to the new windows-based version of Fujitsu's ConSol solution, ConSol-ePlus, including the modules for appointment scheduling and mobile access. Explaining the decision, Richard Gormley says, “The move to ConSol-ePlus was entirely sensible in terms of advancing the organisation's capability and it was also a real driver to increase the performance of the repairs service.”

The core ConSol-ePlus solution seamlessly controls the processes for job receipt, job progression, job costing, subcontractor control and payment as well as providing stock control and purchase order management.

The appointment scheduling module, from Xmbrace, integrates closely with the Council's existing housing management system and provides a diary function that allows a fixed date and time for repairs to be booked by customers. The work can then be automatically allocated to operatives and subcontractors, based on their skills, location and availability. The module can handle around 400 repair items and is designed to address most housing repair jobs. Each item has a standard time and trade allocation eg. this repair needs a plumber for a 30 minute appointment, and also identifies whether a pair of workmen is needed, whether the job can be done without a pre-inspection and whether multiple trades are involved.

By doing away with the old, paper-based job ticket system, this new structured approach to appointment scheduling has already delivered immediate productivity improvements for the Council, as Richard Gormley explains, “The workforce went very quickly to a point where they are in control and using their time effectively. That happened within the first month of the system going live, and because scheduling a repair is now much more focused you also have more operational flexibility and can make the most efficient use of operatives' time and cut out any unnecessary travel. Since the system went live we have seen a progressive improvement in response time across all repair categories.”

Within just two months the new system has also led to a 15% increase in the number of repairs with appointments, and customers now have an agreed time slot for the work.

With the addition of ConSol-ePlus' mobile data module, developed by Cognito, South Essex Homes' operatives have also now been equipped with hand-held devices, so that they can be sent information about new jobs and notify the completion of works over a radio data network.

Richard Gormley continues, “We can now ensure that our operatives get live information about their work allocation throughout the day. So, instead or relying on people to prioritise their own work schedule, we can place jobs into the hands of the person with the skills and capacity to deal with it - at precisely the time they are needed. That's a real improvement as it gives us better management control, makes more efficient use of our resources and removes the cost and time overheads of a paper-based system.

“In effect, Fujitsu's ConSol-ePlus solution has provided us with a genuine platform for change - in our processes and people's attitudes to what and how we do things - and has allowed us to begin to address inefficiencies. And because we have been able to streamline our processes and changed the organisational culture it has enhanced the relationship with our contractors, because there is a much greater clarity of roles. We can now be much more accurate in specifying what we want, so less time is spent discussing requirements and we can negotiate from a position of real strength. That in turn enables us to maintain our competitiveness and improve our repair service still further.”

Benefits to our Customer

The use of Fujitsu's ConSol-ePlus solution is providing Southend-on-Sea Borough Council with a range of benefits:

Improved service - customers can book an agreed time for any repair work and be sure that they will receive the right person for the right job at the right time
Greater efficiency - job allocation and response times are significantly reduced through the intelligent planning and localised daily scheduling of work loads, which can be instantly updated throughout the day
Increased productivity - operatives can be `kept working longer with less travel time to jobs and no overlap of resources
Reduced costs - process automation and the optimised deployment of resources are generating significant operational savings. Fujitsu estimates that on average organisations will save 35% a year (giving a return on investment in 9-18 months)
Full accountability - all jobs or assignments have a complete audit trail in compliance with the latest government regulations
Improved management - accurate job information is instantly available to monitor daily performance or for future performance analysis and reporting
Long term ROI - the system can easily be tailored and new best-of-breed applications incorporated to meet evolving business needs.

Richard Gormley says, “The big picture is all about delivering a better service to our citizens and providing them with decent homes. Housing repairs are such a critical part of that process that we have to get it right - it is fundamental to our purpose. ConSol-ePlus has enhanced the knowledge and intelligence we have available to implement a planned programme of housing repair and development much more effectively and responsively. It also has the potential to reduce overheads and free up money needed to support a major programme of capital expenditure that we are about to embark upon..”

Our Approach

To minimise any potential risk, Fujitsu adopted a phased approach to the implementation with extensive user testing of each component. Even so, the entire project was successfully completed in just six months and the new system went live without any major problems.

Richard Gormley comments, “Despite the fact that the work had to be completed within a very compressed timetable and the fact that some aspects of the solution had to be modified to accommodate changes to our business model Fujitsu delivered the project successfully on time and within budget.”

The Expertise

With over 30 years experience of supporting the needs of government departments and local authorities, Fujitsu has a proven track record in providing complex systems integration services and mobile solutions that reduce costs, improve productivity and customer services and deliver a compelling return on investment.

“We've worked with Fujitsu for a long time now,” says Richard Gormley, “and we have confidence it its ability to deliver what it promises. Any issues that we have had have been minor and they are always resolved very quickly without the need for any intervention on our part. They have worked very well with our project management consultant PMCDE Ltd and together have delivered. We certainly consider Fujitsu to be a trusted partner, and appreciate the good working relationship and the helpful support and advice that we receive.”

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