In common with most housing providers, Bedfordshire Pilgrims Housing Association’s daily postbag comprises hundreds of items, resulting in BPHA housing assistants spending a total of at least 10 hours a day on repetitive tasks such as opening post, inputting data and scanning a combination of letters, application forms, tenants’ information and change of address details.
After assessing the time and costs of processing its mail, BPHA asked Optical Record Systems to suggest a more efficient and money-saving way to improve business productivity and free up staff time, resulting in BPHA outsourcing its data capture and forms-processing functions to ORS following a two-month implementation.
BPHA now sends its documentation to ORS three times a week, where specific data relating to tenants is captured, checked for accuracy, scanned and fed electronically back into BPHA’s housing management system where the data can then be easily disseminated around the organisation via workflow.
The ORS solution has saved BPHA valuable time in resources and thousands of pounds a year in costs. It also means staff can access information much faster and more efficiently than before, as well as allowing BPHA’s housing assistants to spend more time on core business activities.
London & Quadrant visits ORS
London & Quadrant’s director of information systems, Peter Watson, recently visited ORS’ offices in Southampton recently, accompanied by George Grant, publisher of Housing Technology. With a reputation for not suffering fools gladly, Watson said, “ORS is possibly the best-kept secret in our sector.”
Referring to the potential of ORS’ document management and scanning services, Watson added, “The housing sector wastes huge amounts of cash reinventing services that could easily be outsourced to specialists. Housing providers communicate with millions of tenants and residents but waste both time and money due to outdated business processes. Something needs to be done that doesn’t cost the earth.”
