The firm awarded a £1.9m council contract – hailed as key to saving taxpayers £3.6m over the next 10 years – has been embroiled in major issues with another local authority.
Westmorland & Furness Council announced that its contract for new software for revenues and benefits would be awarded to Civica UK Ltd.
The new single system will replace existing legacy systems from the former Barrow, Eden and South Lakeland councils.
The firm, which provides digital services for the public sector, says it is a global leader. However, its work with Norwich City Council hit a major stumbling block when it attempted an upgrade.
Civica UK Ltd has worked with the city council for 20 years and plans were put in place to upgrade its revenues and benefits system, with a completion date of 2023.
However, a series of technical issues have meant that last month – two years after the agreed completion date – both parties agreed not to move forward with the upgrade. The city council will continue using the existing Civica system.
In Cumbria, Westmorland & Furness Council considered three tenders for the streamlining project and Civica UK Limited was awarded the contract after a ‘robust evaluation’, the authority said.
Westmorland & Furness Council said the updated service would mean an end to inefficiencies caused by having to work across separate platforms and systems and enable the streamlining of practices, creating a more consistent customer experience.
The service currently bills more than 116,000 domestic properties and 15,000 businesses and calculates and pays more than 18,000 housing benefit and council tax support claims, completing more than one million transactions per year.
The contract is for an initial seven years, with the option for three further years.
The total investment over the 10-year period is estimated at £1.9m, which includes one off implementation costs of £312,000 payable across 2025/2026 and 2026/2027 followed by a saving of approximately £390,000 each year, the authority said.
Cllr Andrew Jarvis, the council’s cabinet member for finance, said the award demonstrated the value of a unitary authority being able to simplify and improve services for residents across a large area while at the same time delivering considerable savings.
