North Somerset Council has selected IT consultancy, Kainos, to implement its electronic document and records management system (EDRMS). The first project is underway in Adult Social Services & Housing and expected to go live in the next few months.

Kainos was awarded the contract following a market tender which attracted a number of supplier responses. The deal was sealed after North Somerset Council held reference discussions with Havant Council, another user of Kainos’ services.

Barrimore England-Davis, EDRM Project Manager at North Somerset Council commented, “Kainos’s track record implementing EDRM solutions in other councils was very comforting to North Somerset. Havant spoke very highly of their experience.”

North Somerset has already made significant headway tackling the EDRM demands of its Adult Social Services and Housing department. This department relies entirely on paper files but a recent white paper that indicated the benefits of handling electronic rather than paper files, provided the necessary impetus to help this department to ‘go electronic’. The EDRM system links closely with the department’s patient care system and all new correspondence coming into the department will be scanned, indexed and stored electronically.

Barrimore explains, “EDRM will make a great difference to the speed and accuracy with which we find information. The cost of maintaining and supporting documents in filing cabinets is simply staggering when you account for floor space, management, retrieval, heat, light & storage. These are some of the very tangible savings that we expect to realise through the broader implementation of electronic document and records management technology across departments.”

Barrimore and the implementation team have their sights set on a number of departments that will benefit from EDRM technology across the council.