Thirty thousand sign up for online accounts with council
Friday July 8, 2011
Residents in Hammersmith & Fulham are doing their bit to help cut council costs. Thirty thousand local people have signed up for online accounts, which represents 40% of the 75,000 households in the borough.
Hammersmith & Fulham has led the way in developing a single online account log-in system for all its major services - everything from renewing your parking permits to checking your council tax or reporting litter.
"Self-service accounts have already saved us £50k in its first year and we expect that to rise to £150k a year, " says Council Leader, Cllr Stephen Greenhalgh.
"At a time when public services are hard pressed, self-service accounts are more convenient for residents and save the council money. Residents are now able to manage their own accounts with us at any time of the day or night without leaving home. The lower cost of online self-service also means they are helping us cut back-office costs so that every possible penny of their council tax gets to the frontline services they rely on such as street cleaning and care for the elderly.
"Success in encouraging residents to use our online services requires a real change in the way councils think and behave. Designing services that people want, in a way they find easy and convenient to use, is creating a profound rethink in the way councils operate, making services more efficient in the process and fuelling innovative ways of rethinking old problems."
Online accounts are part of a wider self-service strategy across the council that is scheduled to produce savings of over £1 million a year in H&F .
As well as existing online services such as the 24/7 e-library, roadwork searches, online planning applications, consultations and school place applications, H&F council is now working on e-bookings for services such as sports and hall hire.
"Over the next year, the council aims to move to full self-service for all transactional services including full information,application, booking and reporting capability for all services".
