With the UK's central government continuing with a firm policy of cuts to reduce the deficit, local authorities have remained amongst the hardest hit.
Juggling an increasingly stringent supply from Westminster with rising expectation levels from residents has left British councils, for the forseeable future at least, up against it in their efforts to maintain the status quo - with the situation not made any easier now a further round of austerity measures are predicted for 2015.
Late 2013 saw Lancashire county council reveal just how tough the job was. With demands to see £176 million saved over three years and increase of no more than 2% in council tax, Lancashire opened up a forecast calculator to the public - handing them the reins on where they thought the money should and shouldn't be spent between 2015-18.
The resource revealed the myriad of issues that arose with the smallest change to budgets, serving a sobering insight into the obstacles that councils are facing everyday in light of big changes to their spending. Issues which are inevitable if council's fail to adapt to the conditions they now find themselves in.
Open policy & adaptation
But it's not all doom and gloom. Many authorities are in fact demonstrating a propensity for adaptation.
As with Lancashire many councils have become more familiar with and eager to take on their new environments, approaching them with a 'working out loud' policy that brings transparency and an openness to new ideas.
Chesterfield were among those that joined this movement, releasing a 'Channel Shift Action Plan' for 2015-17. The report highlighted the need to act promptly with 3.5 million in cuts hitting the council during the lifetime of the report.
Research from Socitm was also highlighted in the report, demonstrating the overall value of channel-shift as truly significant, with face to face (£7.40) and phone transactions (£2.90) falling dramatically with online processing (£0.32).
2014 sees over half now planning for channel-shift
Necessity as they say is the mother of invention and in the lives of public sector organisation 2014 was unquestionably the year that saw the biggest adoption of new and innovative methodologies - particularly in the mindsets of central and local government where digital by default became a synonymous term with the landscape of future practices.
A survey which asked the question "Has your organisation adopted a Channel Shift strategy" revealed this most explicitly, with an increasing number of respondents indicating a strategy was in place, rising from 39% in 2013 to 58% in 2014. With such a dramatic rise in strategic thinking and implementation around channel shift, its clear local government places a much greater emphasis on online conversion as a factor for sustainability and growth, both for the immediate and long term future of operations.
Local gov cited over half of senior executives questioned planned to send as much 74% of services online - with mobile web outlined as a big player in forecasted savings.
The total sum that culminated from the report amounted a 670 million annual saving nationwide on 2015's reduced budgets, where channel shift was implemented - and it's fair to say given the evidence of 2014 that the UK is well on its way towards realising that figure.
Tips for 2015
Some hurdles do still exist, we'll discuss those in our '6 Ways to Ensure Effective Channel Shift in 2015' in the New Year, but the marker for success amidst a bleak financial playing field is now firmly set in the channel shift camp.
So here's to another good year, and with some of our handy tips to help you plan for channel shift effectively, we're sure 2015 is going to be even better.
Zipporah Ltd is an established and leading supplier of online solutions to both public and private sector organisations. Our products include E-Booking, E-Commerce, Leisure Management, Queuing, Scheduler, All in one and One Stop Shop Applications – working to streamline processes, reduce costs, improve profits and optimise service management, facilitating a faster, more effective and efficient approach to business operations.
