Maribyrnong Council

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Fujitsu helps Maribyrnong Council lift performance on traffic management

An integrated document management system designed and delivered by Fujitsu Australia has improved customer service, increased reliability and boosted staff productivity by 20 per cent for Maribyrnong City Council. The new portal has lifted efficiency and accuracy in the Council's Traffic and Local Laws department and this success is encouraging Maribyrnong IT managers to look at further ways to extend the solution. Maribyrnong City Council is a local government authority covering a densely populated 31-square-kilometre region in inner-city Melbourne. The Council is responsible for administering a range of services to local businesses and residents, including planning and building, waste management, community support services, parking and local laws.

Historically, Maribyrnong Council used hard-copy documentation to process traffic infringement notices and correspondence about parking issues, including appeals. Staff in the Traffic and Local Laws division found this approach cumbersome, time-consuming and unreliable, with vital documents frequently going missing. This created a serious cost burden for the Council and records management staff were frequently called upon to retrieve document copies from the correspondence archive system.

In 2001, Maribyrnong IT staff began exploring options to tackle these issues with a more modern document management platform. Fujitsu approached the Council with a proposal to trial Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server as a user-friendly centralised document hub.

"We were at the point where we were looking for something to improve our processes but didn't have a place to start, when Fujitsu essentially brought the solution to us," recalls Rosa Cursio, Team Leader Customer Liaison, Traffic and Local Laws, Maribyrnong City Council.

Although the Council already used a range of Microsoft products such as Microsoft Office, it had not used SharePoint. As a proof-of-concept, Traffic and Local Laws agreed to evaluate the portal technology for processing infringements and appeals.

Fujitsu solution streamlines document management for Maribyrnong

Fujitsu's Professional Services team installed Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server 2001 and integrated the portal software with the Council's record management process using the Ascent Capture integration tool. The portal currently runs off an internal SharePoint database, although Maribyrnong Council is investigating migrating the system to a Microsoft SQL Server database.

Fujitsu built direct links between the new system and the Council's existing correspondence acquisition environment to ensure all incoming documents scanned by the Council's Information Management team are automatically loaded into the SharePoint-based workflow processes.

Fujitsu also created a metadata management system to help Information Management staff add basic tracking information during the document acquisition phase. This helps staff locate documents using variables such as client name, date or ticket number. In addition, the SharePoint software flags all new incoming documents requiring action so work can be directed to the appropriate Traffic and Local Laws staff member. Another workflow component balances the distribution of incoming jobs between team members.

For end users, the portal system is straightforward. Fujitsu created a customised Web interface that Maribyrnong staff simply access through the Internet Explorer 6.0 browser included in their standard desktop environment. The Fujitsu-built Web front-end enhances the basic SharePoint Portal Server to give the Traffic and Local Laws team tailored views of the information according to commonly used criteria. Documents continue to be edited in Microsoft Word. "Fujitsu created an interface that is simple, practical and takes into account the skills of our user base," says Duncan Kelly, IT Business Analyst, Maribyrnong City Council. "The integration team even used our corporate colours: coupled with SharePoint training from Fujitsu and our continued use of Word, users have adapted to the new system very quickly."

Portal approach lifts staff productivity by 20 per cent and slashes response time

After using the system for just over 12 months, Maribyrnong Council has already identified significant improvements in staff efficiency, response time, accuracy and customer satisfaction.

So far, the Council estimates the Fujitsu solution has boosted productivity in the Traffic and Local Laws division by around 20 per cent. Workflow load balancing features are supplemented by SharePoint management tools that enable Council managers to see each staff member's case load at any given time. "SharePoint gives me a detailed picture of what's going on so I can allocate extra resources to correspondence and improve staff rotation between phone, desk and counter duties as the workload changes," Ms Cursio explains. "This really helps us stay on top of our workflow and minimise backlog."

The portal solution has also helped cut response times. Previously, it would take five to nine weeks for Council to respond to unpaid infringement notices or appeals. SharePoint has slashed this to less than three days. "Some clients now complain that our response is too fast and worry that their appeal may not receive proper consideration. In fact, the amount of time we spend considering the case has not changed - it's just that the process has become so much more efficient," says Ms Cursio.

Customer service is not just faster with SharePoint: quality has also improved significantly. The integrated portal system allows customer service agents to instantly call up relevant notices, correspondence and other documentation when a client wishes to discuss their case via telephone or over the counter. Previously it could take up to 15 minutes to track down these documents in hard copy.

"Staff used to spend hours every week looking for documents. Now it is a much smoother operation: staff simply look up the matter on SharePoint and respond to queries immediately," Ms Cursio says. "Status-tracking tools enable us to tell clients exactly what stage their appeal has reached, which makes for happy customers and less stress within our team."

Automation keeps documents under control and moving

Under the Council's old manual arrangements, around two per cent of documents would routinely go missing. This resulted in lost revenue, as fines had to be cancelled if the documentation was incomplete. The SharePoint solution has lifted reliability very close to 100 per cent, increasing revenue and giving Traffic and Local Laws staff access to all case documents at the click of a mouse.

SharePoint is also used to escalate correspondence that requires the attention of senior staff. The mayor's executive assistant and support staff have electronic access to relevant parts of the system for appeals taken to a higher level. This ensures there is no additional administrative burden for Traffic and Local Laws staff. From a management perspective, SharePoint Portal Server also provides tools to generate monthly reports on departmental activity and performance. This capability replaced an unreliable approach where staff simply counted their own completed cases.

While the Traffic and Local Laws implementation remains a pilot, Maribyrnong Council has already been impressed with the return on investment and business benefits form the SharePoint solution delivered by Fujitsu.

"There are many other departments that may be able to use it in future, so we are keen to push ahead with SharePoint as soon as possible," says Duncan Kelly. "Fujitsu has delivered ROI in spades with this implementation."