The London Borough of Hounslow has this week awarded an outsourcing contract worth £50m.

The council appointed BPO service provider Liberata on a 10-year contract to manage a host of Hounslow’s back office functions including the administration and payment of housing and council tax benefits, council tax and national non-domestic rates billing, collection and recovery as well as the preparation of grant claims and government returns. The company will also provide a call centre and some front office services.

Liberata was awarded the contract following a re-tendering process under EU procurement rules. The company was one of four short-listed by Hounslow. The others were Capita, Northgate (formerly SX3) and Serco (formerly ITNET). The company was selected as the preferred bidder at a meeting of the council executive, with negotiations completed and a contract formally signed recently.

As part of this contract, a number of initiatives will be introduced to improve delivery of services to Hounslow residents.

Cllr.Jagdish Sharma, deputy leader of Hounslow Council, said: "We are pleased to announce Liberata Plc as the Council's preferred supplier of the management of our revenues and benefits service.

"Overall, Liberata's bid promised delivery of quality services for Hounslow's residents and represented the best value for money for the Council."

The new contract will officially begin in January 2006, when it takes over from the existing supplier, Serco. There will be a gradual transition to Liberata over the next few months.

Copyright © eGov monitor Weekly (http://www.egovmonitor.com/)

eGov monitor Weekly is a free e-newsletter covering developments in UK eGovernment and public sector IT over the last seven days. To register go here (http://www.egovmonitor.com/newsletter/signup.asp).

Related stories

Barnsley teams with Bull (13 July 2006)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/07/13/barnsley_bull_partnership/
Capita chairman quits over Labour loan row (23 March 2006)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/23/labour_loan_capita/
Generalissimo Blairo 'fesses up on loans (21 March 2006)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/21/labour_loans_scandal/
Rochdale outsources IT in £200m deal (14 March 2006)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/14/rochdale_outsources_it/
Serco Solutions appoints new COO (14 February 2006)
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2006/02/14/serco_coo/
The outsourcing commandments (5 January 2006)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/01/05/outsourcing_offshore_development/
Northgate, Dixons rocked by oil depot blast (12 December 2005)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/12/12/oil_blast_northgate/
Small.biz grabs more UK public sector deals (7 December 2005)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/12/07/smes_win_more_uk_public_sector_contracts/
Capita wins over second city (1 December 2005)
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2005/12/01/capita_birmingham/
Save money...work at home, says Telewest (15 November 2005)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/11/15/telewest_councils/
DTI hands Serco £125m IT deal (8 November 2005)
http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2005/11/08/dti_deal_serco/
More outsourcing = more unhappiness (8 June 2005)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/06/08/outsource_grows/
Swansea IT staff to strike over outsourcing deal (4 August 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/08/04/swansea_it_strike/
Inverclyde IT staff fight outsource threat (15 June 2004)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/06/15/inverclyde_strike/