Customer since 2016

Support over 650 staff and 48 councillors across 10 sites

Based in Clacton-on-Sea

Product: ITSM

Tendring District Council, formed in 1974, look after over 145,000 residents in the picturesque northeast of Essex. It covers rural areas, the popular seaside resorts of Clacton, Frinton, and Walton, and the port of Harwich. With a summer influx of tourists, the council’s population continues to grow significantly. Local authorities, like Tendring, increasingly rely on technology to deliver effective and efficient services to their citizens and businesses. The council’s IT service team plays a crucial role, supporting over 650 users, including 48 councillors, across 10 locations, helping to keep everything running smoothly.

What Tendring District Council was looking to achieve:

In 2016, after more than two decades of outsourcing its IT services, Tendring Council decided it was time to bring their IT service desk back in-house. As Judy Barker, Information Governance & IT Services Manager, explains: “We see the service desk as IT’s shop window, as it can often be the only direct contact that end-users have with our team. We wanted to provide an efficient, effective, and proactive service when we moved back to an in-house model.”

The council knew it needed the right IT service management (ITSM) solution to make this transition a success. After researching the market and going through a full tender process, Tendring chose Sunrise Software in October 2015. It wasn’t just about functionality - Sunrise also provided great value for money and the flexibility to grow with the council’s needs.

How Sunrise helped them achieve this:

Tendring selected Sunrise ITSM for a few key reasons: it matched their needs, delivered great value, and could easily scale up as the council’s requirements grew. After reviewing the market, Tendring felt confident in Sunrise’s ability to deliver a reliable and flexible solution. The council appreciated the support from Sunrise throughout the project, ensuring a smooth transition to their new IT service management system.

The rollout was rapid, with the contract awarded in October 2015, and the system going live shortly after the Christmas break. By January 2016, the IT service desk was fully operational, handling queries via phone, email, and face-to-face channels. Sunrise's intuitive interface allowed the council to customise the platform according to its specific needs. The service desk team also used Sunrise to log security concerns, incidents, and first-line fixes, ensuring that more complex issues were easily escalated.

The Results

Since implementing Sunrise, Tendring’s IT service desk has delivered continual reliable and uninterrupted support to its staff and councillors. The service desk handles incoming calls and emails 5 days per week and logs and assigns fault issues, help and training requests and security incidents to the relevant support team. It also efficiently resolves many issues at first contact using the Sunrise system’s knowledge base facility. Customisation has made the system easy to use, and its flexibility supports the council’s future plans. Judy highlighted, “We particularly like the ease of use and the intuitive interface, which we’ve customised to meet our needs in every area.”

Sunrise has also enabled the council to respond to significant organisational changes, including its Transformation Programme, which involved office rationalisation, channel shifts in customer service, and investments in IT infrastructure such as the rollout of Microsoft Teams. Sunrise continues to underpin these initiatives, helping the council adapt to greater mobile and remote working.

In Judy’s words, “Sunrise enables us to successfully deliver a good quality of service to our customers, helping the council to achieve its objectives by supporting the business to deliver the best possible service to Tendring’s citizens and visitors.”

Sunrise has provided Tendring District Council with the essential tools to successfully bring their IT service desk back in-house, with the overarching goal of delivering seamless, proactive support to both staff and councillors. The platform’s flexibility, reliability, and ease of use have been pivotal in achieving this objective. As Judy Barker puts it, “Sunrise provides us with all of the functionality we need - now and in the foreseeable future. The team there are always friendly, approachable, willing to engage, and keen to ensure that we remain successful in what we do.”

With Sunrise ITSM, Tendring Council is not only able to efficiently support internal operations but is also well-positioned to continue delivering excellent services to its citizens, enabling them to meet both their current and evolving needs.