West Devon Borough Council tendered for the contracting out of its revenues and benefits service in 1996. The 'in house' team maintained the service until 1996, when the new contract was awarded to Capita.
The service has maintained top quartile performance in council tax and business rate collection. Benefits performance is improving and is now 2nd quartile. Customer satisfaction is good with most benefits indicators in the first or 2nd quartiles.
The council will have made direct savings of over £;185,000 over the first five years of the contract - when compared to their costs of running the service before. The council estimates additional efficiency savings of over £1.5 million and a new, more easily accessible office location has been provided by the contractor.
In relation to the efficiency challenge, what barriers did they encounter?
- Partnerships
- Staffing issues
- Benchmarking