The meeting on 21 March 2025 was for a decision to be made by officers under delegated authority. The only item on the agenda was the award of a contract for the provision of contact centre services for Newham Council.

Contact Centre Re-procurement

A report was included in the meeting pack about the award of a contract for Newham Council's contact centre telephony solution.

The report explained that: The current contract for the Ring Central contact centre solution expires on 31st March 2025.

Because the existing contract with Daisy Corporate Services Limited was due to expire, the report sought approval for Conrad Hall, Corporate Director of Resources, to directly award a new contract to Daisy Corporate Services Trading Limited.

The new contract would be for two years, with an option to extend for 12 months, and would cost £857,789.47.

The report described the existing platform as fit for purpose and economically advantageous to the Council as it will meet our short to medium term requirements. However, the report proposed that the new contract should be a short-term measure to allow time to procure a new contact centre solution that would better meet the council's longer-term requirements.

The report acknowledged that the new contract would cost more than the existing agreement.

The current telephony system which is coming to the end of life currently costs £134k pa, so this represents an increase in costs.

The report argued that these additional costs were justified because:

Essential additional functionality is being introduced to provide improved resident experience and efficiencies, primarily integration with Microsoft Dynamics and provision of a knowledge base which necessitates the implementation cost and uplifted licencing costs.

The report explained that the council had considered and rejected two alternative options:

• Not renewing the contract with Daisy Corporate Services Limited, and not putting in place any alternative arrangements for contact centre telephony. This was rejected because Delivery of these services is a core part of supporting our residents which the Council would not be able to provide effectively.
• Extending the existing contract with Daisy Corporate Services Limited for a year. This was rejected because This option will not provide enough time for the Council to engage in a longer term procurement exercise or to deliver the essential tools necessary for the immediate savings planned through the Transforming Newham for the Future programme as well as introduce a risk of challenge from other vendors.

The report concluded by stating that the decision to award the contract would allow the council to continue to provide contact centre services to residents while it developed plans to procure a new contact centre solution in the longer term.