Lambeth's winning team

Lambeth's eGovernment and IT Services wins national recognition for its pioneering work in the technological field of customer services.

Councillor Ashley Lumsden, Lambeth executive member for finance, congratulates some of Lambeth’s eGovernment team on winning two national awards for its work in promoting joined up government.

“These excellent results are yet more proof of how hard Lambeth is working to improve services to residents, “ said Councilor Lumsden, thanking the team for all its efforts.

The team was celebrating the fact that it has just won the Customer Service Award at the inaugural Good Communications Awards in London. The awards are designed to "Recognise excellence in public sector communications and joined up government".

The judging panel, which included the British Computing Society and the Plain English Campaign, singled out Lambeth for the work done to transform the way customers access and interact with council services, using CRM, middleware and record matching, the web, telephone and face-to-face contact centres. Further details are available at the GCA website.

Only weeks before, Lambeth was runner up (to Leeds City Council) in the Society of Information Technology Management (SOCITM) Local Government IT Excellence awards. SOCITM is the professional association for ICT managers in the public sector, with members from the police and fire services, housing authorities and other locally delivered public service, as well as local authorities.

The judges said that Lambeth had “created a virtual electronic customer record and automating customer services across the council. Customers can now get instant information about their housing repairs, rent payments, map location of the pothole they want to report or information about their social care assessment and more.”

Simon Morioka (Head of eGovernment and IT Services) adds, "We are very pleased that judges at two separate national awards ceremonies have chosen to recognise the hard work put in by project teams in Lambeth, made up not just of members of eGovernment and IT Services but representatives of every department of the council. This recognition not only supports our ongoing improvement in CPA and other formal measures, but reflects genuine transformation of the way in which increasing numbers of Lambeth customers interact with the council, allowing us to focus what resources we have on core service delivery. Increasingly Lambeth is being asked to assist other councils in these areas, which is something we are not only happy to do but can and should be proud of as an authority".