**Ricoh Business Process Services** Local Government
Case Study | London Borough of Camden
Camden Council has put in place a Smarter Working Programme to improve community service delivery. A key part of the programme is a Ricoh Business Process Service that is helping the council reduce costs, increase business process agility and make services more efficient and effective.
Name
London Borough of Camden
Location
London
Size
4,000 staff
Activity
Local Government
Challenges
Solution
Ricoh Business Process Services covering:
Benefits
The London Borough of Camden is the local government authority for 230,000 people living and working in a central and vibrant part of the UK capital. The council has a strong social ethos to provide the best possible public services and make Camden a place where everyone has a chance to succeed and nobody gets left behind.
To achieve that mission, the council is digitising its use of data and information to deliver joined-up services, have more informed decisions and make it easier for citizens to access services. It also aims to increase agile and flexible working to improve collaboration and respond quickly to changing circumstances and the needs of its community.
Under its Smarter Working Programme, the council wanted to improve its post and print operation by shifting it from a traditional, on-site process to a digital one. There was a drive to increase digital services and therefore reduce print and associated costs and environmental impact. The mailroom, for
instance, was manual, slow and labour-intensive and print was becoming costly to run and occupied expensive real-estate. At the time, the council was planning to relocate itsheadquarters. These functions were siloed with one department processing mail and the other printing letters.
Camden issued a tender under a public sector purchasing framework agreement. But having seen the quality of services Ricoh was providing to another London authority - Westminster City Council - Camden wanted to bring in Ricoh to help with its digital transformation.
Camden is using a Ricoh Business Process Service to deliver digital transformation and outsource most of its mail and document handling functions. The service covers three areas of operation - production and managed print, document management and inbound and outbound digital mailroom services.
Much of Camden’s print is now managed by Ricoh and produced either by a Ricoh production print centre or by a Ricoh and Camden-approved specialist reprographics companies. This has enabled the council to re-deploy staff and free up space for more cost-effective use. The service is used for several print jobs such as council tax statements,
voting cards and copying documents like committee and legal papers. It also includes specialised print jobs such as ad-hoc bulk printing for items like food inspection pads and booklets. Standard office printing is still handled in-house using a range of multifunction devices located in offices.
The council uses a Ricoh Hybrid Mail service – called MailSmart – that manages most of the council’s mail. When staff create a letter, they click print and it is automatically sent to a Ricoh production print centre for processing, adding relevant inserts and posting. Ricoh is processing around 10,000 mailings a week for the council. The service also includes outbound and inbound mail processing and printing for parking-related correspondence and scanning items such as revenue and benefits documents.
Importantly, these services and solutions integrate with the council’s existing systems such as Northgate Housing and Oracle HR and Finance to achieve more streamlined, automated and agile business processes.
Ricoh Solution/Products
Ricoh Business Process Service
Production and managed print
Document management
Inbound and outbound digital mailroom services
Third-party supplier management
“Using technology to digitise many of our print and mail processes makes a huge difference to efficiency and business agility. And since Ricoh manages it, it takes away that burden if something goes wrong which, in itself, is a significant benefit,” says Ros Daniel.
One example of improved agility is how the council meets statutory obligations. Correspondence related to services such as benefits or housing allocations have to be completed in a specific number of days. Under old processes, meeting this target was challenging and consumed a lot of time and resources. Now it is fast, efficient
and much easier for staff. Ros Daniel says, “With MailSmart people know that when they click a letter to print it will go straight to the resident. Before it would go to print and had to be proofed, then you’d have to check the letter had been collected and mailed out.”
Other efficiency examples include simple features like streamlining and automating insert enclosures, and standard letter templates instead of different versions depending on department and individual. Also, processes are more joined up so that a resident only gets one or two letters instead of five or six that they might have received previously.
Ros Daniel says, “Ricoh makes sure all suppliers are meeting the KPIs that we expect from our partners. So we are benefiting from Ricoh’s quality control and data security, and Ricoh’s expertise in bringing new solutions that fit into our digital strategy. This ability to work collaboratively and being able to respond quickly to changing circumstances helps our service heads manage operations efficiently and effectively.”
The council has seen a significant reduction in print, document management and mail costs since these functions are now payper-use rather than the council having to invest in and maintain a full in-house print and mail operation. Further savings result from having one supplier manage print and mail, and Ricoh commanding significant reductions in Royal Mail costs because of bulk buying.
The Ricoh solution has enabled Camden Council to improve several internal operations which are reducing costs, increasing efficiency and business process agility, and helping to improve services to citizens.
Ricoh acts as an umbrella manager for all of Camden’s print. It simplifies the whole process and improves quality and variety, but still gives the council freedom to retain existing print partners as well as choose the best provider for each project.
Ricoh is empowering digital workplaces using innovative technologies and services enabling individuals to work smarter. For more than 80 years, Ricoh has been driving innovation and is a leading provider of document management solutions, IT services, communication services, commercial and industrial printing, digital cameras, and industrial systems.
Headquartered in Tokyo, Ricoh Group operates in approximately 200 countries and regions. In the financial year ended March 2020, Ricoh Group had worldwide sales of 19.06 billion USD.
For further information, please visit www.ricoh.co.uk