Rocktime today welcomes two more councils to the verso™ family. Both City of Lincoln and Sandwell Metropolitan Borough councils have made agreement with Rocktime to transform their regulatory service functions in regard to Private Sector Licensing (HMO) using its market-leading verso™ software.
As the 1st October deadline for applications approaches for mandatory licensing an increasing number of councils are looking to automate the process of licensing private sector properties given the fact that landlords are aware that by failing to apply for required licenses by 1st October 2018 will result in committing a criminal offense from this date. This leaves local authorities with a duty to raise awareness and support compliance both quickly and effectively, and a requirement to ensure their software and processes are equipped to cope with the additional licence applications expected in advance of the changes being enforced.
Councils nationwide including Sefton, Wirral, Northampton, City of York, Oxford City Councils and a number of inner London councils are investing in the popular verso™ platform for licensing, which automates key processes to reduce administrative efforts for councils and supports channel shift for an enhanced online customer journey for the citizens.
As a flexible, cost-effective solution, the platform allows local authorities to seamlessly manage increased demand in their areas and features full workflow and document production facilities. The benefit of such efficiencies results in the greater availability of officer time to focus on other work priorities and reduces unnecessary communication by providing an automated, tracked channel of communication to licence applicants.
For HMO specifically, multiple schemes are supported such as Mandatory, Selective and Additional licensing, Variations, Revocations and TENS to deliver time, resource and cost management savings across the spectrum. Scalable for authorities of all sizes, the verso™ platform can also be expanded to service multiple local authority departments including Taxi’s, Food, Street Traders, Personal and Premises licences.
Once again, we see verso™ disrupting the market and upsetting the status quo by delivering transformation, service and value to a market dominated by the major I.T. players. I very much look forward to working with City of Lincoln and Sandwell Council in transforming both the citizen and the council officers experience regarding regulatory services.