Knowledge Hub.

ContrOCC Health Check at Milton Keynes Council: A Local Authority Viewpoint.

"A big part of the Health Check was the change to Milton Keynes Council's service groups and budget derivation rules, which were implemented successfully in readiness for the LAS go live. OCC colleagues were always approachable and available to offer guidance and support, sometimes at short notice."

What is a Health Check?

Health checks are a chance to have a full system run-through with our expert consultants to ensure that the software is being used to its full potential and fits with your business needs. ContrOCC’s core functionality allows local authorities to manage care contracts, to model budget impacts and committed spend in real-time and to streamline payment and charging processes. Efficiencies can become diluted over time through loss of staff, expertise, or because procedures no longer align with system configuration. Inaccuracies in financial and commissioning records can prove expensive. A ContrOCC Health Check can consider approaches to improving data quality and timeliness, meaning that the correct payments or charges are made at the correct time. This can reduce workflow delays and allow you to focus on processes that add value, improve data quality, and facilitate smarter reporting.

Milton Keynes Council

Anne-Marie Brown, Transactions Manager at Milton Keynes Council, spoke to us about the Council’s experience of a ContrOCC Health Check.

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Why did Milton Keynes Arrange for a Health Check?

Milton Keynes Council had been using ContrOCC as a standalone system for over 10 years. As part of the work to integrate with the Liquidlogic case management system (LAS), the opportunity was taken to review functionality and identify any areas that would provide additional benefit to the council. It was important to ensure that the current configuration matched the business processes in place and that the full range of tools within ContrOCC were being utilised.

What were the Key Outcomes?

Another recommendation arising from the Health check which the Council went ahead with was a bespoke training programme designed to fit Milton Keynes Council requirements. It was originally meant to be held onsite, but due to the constraints of the Covid pandemic it was delivered online. Staff were still able to participate fully and complete the training.

“All those who took part found it really useful and the trainer extremely approachable. The training was designed around MKC processes but there was also the opportunity to explore other functionality/options to bring in process benefits.”

Benefits?

“Early benefits have been with the introduction of new Service Groups, which made the April increases more efficient.”

Timings and Lessons Learnt

Ideally the ContrOCC Health Check work would have been planned and implemented prior to the LAS integration. However, during the implementation further areas of work were identified by OCC, mainly around treatment of historical data.

Next Steps

There are still activities that are to be implemented as part of the Health Check, such as the production of Non-Residential invoices from the system. Once this is up running, it will bring both process and resource efficiencies.