CASE STUDY
Quadient helps Horsham District Council deliver vital information to residents
Horsham District Council (HDC) is responsible for “BOTH THE DS-63 AND providing county council services to the region of IM-19 SOLUTIONS ARE Horsham, West Sussex, alongside West Sussex County INCREDIBLY EASY TO USE Council and multiple local parish and neighbourhood AND, UNSURPRISINGLY, councils. HDC’s responsibilities include providing ARE VERY POPULAR information regarding council tax, local elections, and WITH EVERY MEMBER waste collection and household recycling. OF STAFF ACROSS THE ORGANISATION”
Ben North Team Leader Customer Services Challenge The challenge
Automate time-consuming HDC sends up to 3,600 postal items weekly. Outgoing documents manual envelope insertion often include letters, invoices, contracts and leaflets informing and letter opening which was residents of changes to their local area, such as planned impacting the team’s ability developments, alterations to car parking and information to fulfil other responsibilities about local elections. With such a high volume of outgoing mail, members of the customer services team were finding that the Results existing folder inserter could not handle the workload, which meant they would often find themselves having to manually insert Drastic increase in efficiency documents into envelopes. Similarly, managing incoming mail and productivity, with positive was becoming a real issue too. The team had an older slitting effects benefiting the entire machine letter opener that would often damage the documents public sector organisation inside meaning, again, these had to be processed manually.
Solution “Every day the team was finding that it needed to dedicate a lot of time to managing our mail,” said Ben North, team leader, Quadient’s DS-63 Folder Inserter customer services, HDC. “With such a large volume of outgoing is an all-in-one mail manage- and incoming mail, the situation was becoming a real issue with ment solution capable of auto- important tasks being deprioritised as a result. Furthermore, matically filling 2,200 envelopes being a public sector organisation, we’re faced with a limited an hour and folding up to five budget and the old folder inserter and letter opener were documents in tri-fold format no longer providing the cost effectiveness we needed.”
Quadient’s IM-19 Automatic The process Letter Opener can process up to 400 envelopes per minute and With a pressing need to ease the situation on the team, HDC can reduce costs by 50 percent turned immediately to Quadient for advice. Indeed, being a leading provider of mailroom solutions, Quadient was well placed to suggest alternatives to the team’s existing machines. Method As it is a public service organisation, HDC used the Crown Commercial framework to make a direct award to Quadient. Horsham District Council was made aware of Quadient’s Quadient suggested replacing the folder inserter with a DS-63 experience and reputation letter folder and the older slitting opening machine for an IM- of providing leading mail- 19 letter opener. The DS-63 was installed and ready to go after room solutions and used the a week, while the IM-19 was installed soon after, with a demo Crown Commercial frame- machine provided for HDC to use during the waiting period. work to make a direct award For managing incoming mail, the IM-19 Automatic Letter Opener can process up to 400 envelopes per minute
The solution Delivery and results
The DS-63 Folder Inserter is an all-in-one mail management The DS-63 and IM-19 have greatly improved the efficiency solution. Able to fill up to 2,200 envelopes an hour and cost effectiveness of HDC’s mailing processes. The and fold up to five documents in tri-fold format, it is DS-63’s user interface means the team can easily organise fitted with an exclusive FlexFeed feeder mechanism the tasks that need completing and Quadient’s ‘Load ‘N’ meaning it can process just about any insert size or Go’ feature automatically measures envelopes and sets type. Moreover, the easy-to-use graphic touch screen the folds to match. HDC is now able to leave the machine allows for simple set-up, drastically increasing process to complete a number of jobs without having to worry efficiency and reducing the need for human interaction. about loading different sized envelopes for each task, enabling the team to fulfil their other responsibilities. For managing incoming mail, the IM-19 Automatic Letter Opener can process up to 400 envelopes per minute. Similarly, the IM-19’s ability to open such a large volume Developed to increase efficiency, users can experience of mail without damaging the contents has been a huge cost savings of nearly 50 percent compared to manual benefit, especially to the electoral services team which processes. Constructed with two metal motors for better deals with the greatest volume of incoming post. performance and a longer life, the solution is also fitted with milling cutter technology that precisely slits envelope Customer feedback sides so valuable contents are undamaged. “Both the DS-63 and IM-19 solutions are incredibly easy to use and, unsurprisingly, are very popular with every member of staff across the organisation,” continued North. “With over 135,000 residents relying on us for information about their public services and elections amongst other things, the delivery of our mail has become substantially easier since adopting the two solutions.”
About Quadient®
Quadient is the driving force behind the world’s most meaningful customer experiences. By focusing on four key solution areas including Customer Experience Management, Business Process Automation, Mail-Related Solutions, and Parcel Locker Solutions, Quadient helps simplify the connection between people and what matters. Quadient supports hundreds of thousands of customers worldwide in their quest to create relevant, personalised connections and achieve customer experience excellence. Quadient is listed in compartment B of Euronext Paris (QDT) and is part of the CAC® Mid & Small index. For more information about Quadient, visit www.quadient.com.