Penrith City Council takes up Events Perfect

Company: Penrith City Council

Penrith City Council operates 34 neighbourhood facilities like halls and community centres, with some 120 bookable rooms and offices.

13 facilities have individual community based management committees that deal with running the facility. Typically they use a diary for booking of spaces.

The other 21 facilities are directly managed by 3 Neighbourhood Facilities Team staff. The Team is responsible for all management and operational issues including maintenance and cleaning. These facilities have 65 bookable spaces.

Tony Jarrett, Penrith's Neighbourhood Facilities Co-ordinator, reflects on the formation of the Team.

"In July 2001 the Neighbourhood Facilities Team was created, being an amalgam of staff and responsibilities from three Council departments. There were very few common procedures or processes. In fact, things were pretty messy!"

Tony said that there were 21 different booking forms, very few booking conditions, some poor regular hirer invoicing systems, and no readily available data on facility utilisation.

"I knew that we had to focus on our management and administrative systems and procedures. We quickly tackled getting base booking forms and conditions in place so that the public would see a consistent approach from Council," Tony said.
"At the same time, I used to shudder at the sight of all those bloody diaries! At the end of 2001 we had about 45 piled on the desk."

Inevitably, disaster struck with a double booking. Tony said that while this problem was resolved quickly, it highlighted that multiple diaries had inherent risks, no matter how much the Team focussed on accurate diary entries.

Tony used the double booking as a catalyst to win approval to install a computer based booking management system.

"I had run a process to install Council's PABX and Voice Mail system in 1998, utilising tender documents that included functional and technical specifications. I used that same approach for the booking system."

A project team from departments across the organisation worked on developing a comprehensive functional specification, with the IT Department leading work on the technical specification.

The Parrimark Technology response was selected as offering the best value for money from 12 submissions Council received.

Implementation of Events Perfect occurred in October 2002. Initial training was done in the Team's office in the normal work environment. Tony said that Parrimark's trainers were very patient and did a great job in those circumstances. Diary entries were entered progressively by venue, with that task completed on Christmas Eve 2002.

"The immediate benefits of having Events Perfect were evident in the capacity of any Team member able to access booking information from their desk, and for booking application forms to be created and stored electronically."

Penrith Council is reviewing the management and operation of all its community facilities. Events Perfect has enabled utilisation to be accurately reported for the first time.

"Unfortunately, it showed that we had been seriously over-estimating utilisation of our facilities!"

Tony says that the Events Perfect software has significantly improved Team productivity by reducing document production and enabling staff to deal with issues from the desk rather than moving back and forth to share information.
"We have set up a single incoming phone number and a queue. The Chart is a fantastic instant indicator of availability. It sure beats flicking through diary pages."

Events Perfect has also facilitated the elimination of individual "ownership" of venues or customers that tended to occur with diaries.

The Contacts database has also come in handy for bulk mailing, like advice on fee changes.

Penrith Council is only just coming to grips with the more intricate features and capabilities of Events Perfect. Tony says that most of his Team's effort has focussed on administrative procedures that surround and support the software tool.

"I look forward to using Events Perfect to help analyse our customers and establish marketing programmes", he said.

"In our Functional specification, we set out a desired development path for the booking system which included a public internet function. I am excited by the development of EPOnline and Penrith Council will certainly be taking this up."

Tony says that the passion and commitment of Parrimark staff will ensure a long-lasting and productive relationship with Penrith Council.

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