MORE than £700,000 is being provided for short-term extra staffing at a Somerset council as its existing employees struggle to cope with demand.

South Somerset District Council has been undergoing a transformation programme, changing the way in which it works to save money and provide services in a more modern and efficient way for taxpayers.

As the transition takes hold – with staff leaving the organisation in the process – a number of council services are “under pressure”, including planning and its call centre for resident enquiries.

The council will spend the six-figure sum up to March 2021 in an effort to improve customer service levels and reduce waiting times while the last elements of the new working model are put into place.

The additional funding was agreed by the council’s district executive committee at a meeting in Yeovil on Thursday morning (July 4).

The transformation programme is designed to deliver annual savings to the council of around £2.5million from an initial investment of just under £7.7m.

The savings will continue each year, providing some room for manoeuvre in the council’s finances as its grant from central government continues to fall.

Sara Kelly, the officer leading the project, said in her written report that more residents were switching to online services since the new website was launched earlier this year.

But she admitted there had been “considerable challenges” with the roll-out of technology, meaning the transition to the new way of working was taking longer than expected.

Just under one-quarter (23 per cent) of council staff have left the organisation through the transformation process, with the majority leaving in or before December 2018.

With the new system not entirely in place, the staff that remain are having to take on more work – meaning delays in answering residents’ queries or making decisions on planning applications.

A total of £735,220 will be provided to ease this pressure through additional staff over the next two years, with £494,990 being spent in 2019/20 and £240,230 in 2020/21.

Martin Woods, the council’s director of service delivery, said: “The plan is to clear the backlog we have got and to improve customer service.”

Ms Kelly said the funding would be used to “put additional resources in to the areas where staff are under the most pressure” as well as allowing a better quality of service to be sustained as technology was rolled out.

The funding will come from the council’s reserves, retained business rates and from the annual savings the transformation programme is expected to generate.

Councillor Henry Hobhouse was less than enthusiastic about this, claiming the programme would be “13 per cent over-budget” if the extra funding was agreed.

He said: “We have already overspent on our transformation budget by more than £100,000, not including the £320,000 allocated for the planning service in February. Would it be cheaper to start all over again?”

Chief executive Alex Parmley responded: “The transformation programme is not 13 per cent over-budget – we are just delaying the £2.5m savings it will generate.”

The committee voted to approve the additional funding.

Speaking after the meeting, Councillor Tony Lock – portfolio holder for transformation – said services had been under “a sustained period of pressure” and praised the staff for their commitment at this time.

He said: “During this period staff have shown outstanding commitment to the council and its customers and have worked extremely hard to deliver good service.

“Nevertheless, customers are having to wait longer for many services than is desirable, and the pressure on services and staff at this level is not sustainable given it will still be a number of months before some of the services feel the full benefit of the new technology and redesigned service processes.

“We will provide additional staffing capacity for a temporary period, utilizing a mixture of existing staff and, where necessary, external staff and support.

“Funding for the additional resources will be budgeted through a reduction in the anticipated savings that were expected from the transformation programme in 2019 and 2020 – and this will have no impact on services or require any cuts from any other budget.

“We are maintaining a strong focus on its financial health and resilience, and are confident the financial benefits of transformation will be fully realised.

“We are able to offset this temporary delay in delivering some of the savings through judicious use of reserves and additional income, with the confidence that the underlying financial position will not be adversely affected.”