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In 2021, I found myself working in the world of Revenues and Benefits. Before then I didn’t give much thought to what was involved in Council Tax itself. Like many people, I just accepted it as a part of adult life – you get a bill once a year, and if you're like me, you set up a Direct Debit and forget about it.
Having not long returned from the IRRV Annual Conference 2024, always a firm favourite, it’s true when they say everything happens at once. Settle in there’s a lot to share, including: our highlights from the IRRV, welcoming SIX new customers to the webCAPTURE community, and celebrating our long-standing customers.
We’ve recently returned from the IRRV Spring Conference 2024 in Milton Keynes and the aptly named theme, 'Facing the Future: Planning for Change', created quite a buzz. We shared many conversations about what’s currently happening within the industry and how the need to be digitally inclusive is more important than ever. Workloads are increasing as budgets tighten, and the pressure to do more with what you have is relentless. But what can be done to break this cycle? Well, we were on hand to share how our customers have used automation to create ‘space’ for a reallocation of resources to their collection and intervention priorities.
As you may have heard we work a little differently here at Govtech. We like to become one with our customers, forming a partnership where we are seen as an extension of their team. Over the last few months, apart from the everyday automation routine, we’ve worked on other projects with new and existing customers to help them create even more success. Here are a couple of stories where we’ve been delighted to have helped been a part of.
There has never been a better time, or a greater need, for automation in Council Tax. The end of Covid relief schemes and subsequent cost of living pressures have created a huge collection and recovery challenge for local authorities. Faced with severe financial pressures, the loss of expertise, staffing shortfalls, recruitment difficulties and increasing workloads, many Revenues Services are struggling just to stand still. It’s no surprise that FOUR FIVE SEVEN MORE councils (we've had three more since we posted this blog six weeks ago) have chosen to modernise and speed up collection processes through Govtech automation.
Automation has been on the local government agenda for several years now and we all have a pretty good understanding of what it is. Or at least we believe we do. But does it have the same meaning to everyone?
I joined Govtech as their project manager almost 10 years ago. I had just completed 24 years of service for a large London Local Authority, and that was me done; I planned to put my work in Local Government firmly in the rear-view mirror. However, there was one company I felt compelled to say a personal goodbye to, and that was Govtech.
In the current economic climate, more pressure than ever before is being put onto Local Authorities to save money and resources and of course automation plays a big part in that.
Without a doubt, 2022 was a challenging year for the UK. The pandemic, that seemed to have lasted forever, was slowly coming to an end and there was hope that everything might return to normal. But unforeseen events, like the Russian invasion of Ukraine, had a shocking impact on the global economy and, consequently, on everyone's day-to-day life. Energy costs reached previously unheard-of heights and exacerbated inflation.
After an extremely thorough due diligence process, including hours spent speaking with existing Govtech customers such as Salford City Council, Kirklees Metropolitan Borough Council and Plymouth City Council, we’re delighted that Leeds City Council, the second largest local authority in the UK, has selected Govtech to deliver end-to-end automation in Revenues for up to 4 years under G-Cloud.
Its always a busy year end so we’re delighted that our customers have taken time out from annual billing, and even more rebates, to renew or extend our digital process automation services. We’re fortunate to have a strong and loyal customer base, so we’d like to express our thanks to the following councils, who have once again chosen to remain a part of the Govtech family:
Once again, another challenge, another burden faces Revenues teams as the Government look to local authorities to administer the £150 Council Tax energy rebate. As soon as we heard the news, we asked our customers to join a discovery call to see how automation can help them; it became apparent very quickly that it could. So, we delved deeper into what we could do for them (and non-Govtech customers) to overcome this latest challenge.
Let’s explore the issues…