The Charity Commission
Parity forges new strategic partnership with the Charity Commission
The Challenge
The Charity Commission is established by law as the regulator and registrar for the 188,000 charities in England and Wales. It fulfils this role by securing compliance with charity law, and dealing with abuse and poor practice.
The Charity Commission is strongly committed to using new technologies to help with the registration and monitoring of charities in England and Wales. Kevin Chown, Information Systems Controller at the Charity Commission explains,
Solution
Parity was appointed by the Charity Commission to develop and support its core business applications over a five year period. As part of the contract, Parity will undertake a number of significant and wide-ranging e-business developments that will focus on automating administrative tasks and helping the Charity Commission improve efficiencies.
For example, many large organisations store records and documents across a variety of locations, on networks, in email systems and on people’s PCs. The result is that staff may often be unsure whether they are working on the most recent versions of documents. Work may be duplicated or even lost, and records and documents can sometimes be hard to retrieve. Without effective management, it is difficult for any large organisation to effectively harness the knowledge it has accumulated.
To reduce the chances of this happening, Parity is working with the Charity Commission to provide better control and management over all of its documentation and functionality to store complete records of all transactions.
The first major project is the implementation of an Electronic Records and Document Management system (ERDMS) to support the Charity Commission’s complex business processes. The system will help ensure full compliance with standards set by the Public Record Office.
Working in close partnership with the Charity Commission, Parity undertook a thorough and extensive review of approved suppliers and selected a records and document management application that can be tailored to meet the Commission’s specific business requirements.
A model office is being set up as a pilot project to test the new system. A representative subset of users within the Commission will be using the software to support their daily tasks.
explains Steve Campbell, Parity’s project manager.
Benefits
The partnership between Parity and the Charity Commission is already starting to see some innovative uses of technology to improve efficiencies and reduce administrative costs throughout the organisation.
The new ERDMS system will enable the Charity Commission’s staff to collaborate and work more effectively by providing quick and easy access to documents and information. Advanced tracking and workflow functions will also help to ensure records and documents are processed in compliance with regulatory requirements, and provide a full audit trail to improve accountability.
This new system will enhance the Charity Commission’s ability to provide better service to the 180,000 charities it oversees and reduce the administrative load on its staff.
Future
Following on from this development, Parity will be working on some other key business applications. Steve Campbell explains,
Through the introduction of online services, Parity aims to help the Charity Commission provide the best possible regulation of charities in England and Wales, to increase the efficiencies of the charities and to continue to build public confidence and trust in them.
As well as gaining access to a wide range of technical skills and the latest technologies, the Charity Commission will also be able to take advantage of Parity’s vast experience in providing strategic consultancy to the public sector.
Parity’s Group Chief Executive Ian Miller says:
