[Steve Charles, Customer Support Manager Place, to present report]
Minutes:
Charlotte Johns, Director of Strategy, introduced the presentation and advised that a more detailed report could be presented to a future meeting if that would be help on the current and future work of the Digital Print Services (DPS). The panel commented that when a previous report was presented by Gail Rider, Head of ICT, the following recommendations were agreed:
· The Panel support the proposals detailed in the report from Head of ICT to secure all internal printing requirements in-house and removing the option for council departments to commission external companies to undertake such orders.
· The Head of ICT advised the panel that further work will be needed develop a business model to ensure a consistent approach is taken to recharging of work both inside and outside the Council.
The panel expressed concern about the references in the presentation to commercialisation approach to be adopted by DPS and wanted further clarification on the matter to be included in a future report about the implications.
The Director of Strategy commented that agreed that a further report to the panel will be presented to a future meeting in response to the issues highlighted by the panel.
The Director of Strategy invited Jai Ghai, ICT Senior Business Service Manager, to present a briefing to the panel on progress since the previous report of the DPS was presented.
The ICT Senior Business Service Manager gave the panel an update on the following areas of work:
· Kitchen refurbishment
· In-house printing/Design First
· External working
The ICT Senior Business Service Manager gave examples of range of printing work produced by DPS. The work of the service has been supported by colleagues in Procurement Team. The service has received unsolicited enquiries from local schools and other public bodies about printing requests. There is work ongoing to develop a product catalogue about the offer from the service in response to the positive feedback.
The panel were invited to comment on the presentation. The panel queried the progress made to develop costings for external print work as figures quoted during a visit to the DPS were considered to be uncompetitive when compared to other print service companies. The Director of Strategy thanked the panel for their comments and advised that future report would include more detailed costings.
The work will be supported by colleagues in finance. Claire Nye, Director of Finance, advised the panel of the difficulty apportioning overhead management costs such as HR when calculating printing costs. In practice, the Council would take a pragmatic approach when calculating direct costs and overhead costs.
The panel discussed the issue of ballot papers since responsibility for managing electoral services was transferred and the possibility of this work being done by DPS rather than using an external printer. The Director of Strategy advised that there might be a capacity issue and agreed to investigate further and report back on the possibility of DPS undertaking this work. The Director of Strategy added with reference to the idea of producing a catalogue of products and costing that this information could be made available on the Council website as part of the commitment to reduce impact on the environment. The Director of Strategy agreed to include the information in a future paper.
Resolved:
1. The panel welcomed the progress made to develop the DPS and the quality of the work produced.
2. The Director of Strategy agreed to present a future report on the issues highlighted by the panel. The date to be agreed at agenda planning meeting in discussion with the Chair.