Kingston Council Revenues and Benefits Communications Software

Descriptions

The Council has a legal obligation to collect council tax and business rates. It currently raises over £200M each year and the money collected accounts for the main source of the Council's income. As part of this recovery process, as governed by the Local Government Finance Act 1992, the Council issues approximately 30,000 reminder notices for non or late payments of council tax and business rates. All of these notices are issued by post at an approximate cost £10000 per annum. In addition to this the Council issues a further 2500 review letters to residents in receipt of one of the many discounts and exemptions that residents and business ratepayers may claim to reduce their liability check and confirm ongoing entitlement. Both the issue of reminders and review forms result in increased customer contact by phone and traditional paper mail despite the intensive promotion of online self service options available and cause peaks in the workload which inevitably impact on the overall performance of the operation. One of the key objectives of the Revenue Service is to collect outstanding council tax and business rates in a timely and efficient manner. Early intervention enables the Council to identify customers who are vulnerable or in need of financial assistance and provides more chance of preventing a cycle of debt for our customers which will improve the the Council's income in both the short and long term. The Service managed to achieve its highest ever collection rate for council tax in the last financial year (2016/2017) of 99.02% and is looking to not only sustain and build upon this success but also drive down the costs of collection by reducing postage costs. To fulfill these needs the service now requires an intelligent based fully integrated texting software solution system that will be able to send out tracked electronic reminder and review notices either by text or email that will not only encourage payment but promote and increase the use of self service web based forms in line with the Council's desired channel shift strategy.