The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) is responsible for the prosecution of crime in Scotland, the investigation of sudden or suspicious deaths and complaints against the police.
The strategic aim of the COPFS is to provide an independent and modern prosecution service, committed to professional excellence, pursuing cases fairly and consistently in the public interest and being responsive to the public's needs.
The COPFS is publicly funded and takes its responsibilities to the tax payer very seriously, taking a commercial view when its comes to procurement. Gordon Ellis is the Area Business Manager, Highlands and Islands, and is responsible for contract management for the COPFS. He explains: "We were in the situation where our printers and copiers were coming to the end of their useful lives and we had arrangements with various suppliers but no single contract. We made a strategic decision to move towards networked multifunctional devices that can scan, print, copy and fax, all provided by a sole supplier. Then we approached the companies who we felt would provide the best solutions. NRG won the contract because we believed that they would best meet our business needs."
Network connectivity
The COPFS required reliable products with state of the art functionality. Business continuity is very important and this was highlighted by the failure of some of the older products. Technological advancement in relation to networked communications and scanning facilities was also a priority as the COPFS accesses a national database in Scotland and documents are increasingly stored in digital format. Geographical considerations were additional factors as the Highlands and Islands regions that Gordon manages cover on sixth of the landmass of Great Britain. In fact, Lerwick in The Shetland Islands is closer to Oslo than Edinburgh.
Major cost savings
NRG supplied over 150 multifunctional devices (MFDs), including some colour models, as well as two high performance printers for the central reprographics departments. The strategy of the COPFS to switch for MFDs has resulted in improved performance and functionality as well as significant cost savings. Gordon Ellis comments: "We believe that we have made and will continue to make on-going savings. We are buying our consumables much more cost effectively, for example the toner for the MFDs is included within the maintenance costs. There is some cultural resistance in the organisation as some people insist on the convenience of desktop printers, so we still don't have 100% buy in to the use of copiers for printing. However, we believe that this will continue to dissipate over the coming months and even greater savings will be made."
Gordon monitors costs carefully with the help of the team at NRG. He explains: "We collect data from various sources to analyse costs. However, as well as the overall cost savings I needed to know how many prints are being produced on the laser printers, as a percentage of the total output. This information was not readily available so Aidan Kerrigan at NRG created a special spreadsheet which supplies to me every quarter enabling me to assess the indicative savings that we're making on a national basis."
Customer Care
"The team at NRG is very helpful," continues Gordon. "I have an excellent relationship with Aidan Kerrigan, the Regional Sales Manager. He is extremely easy to deal with and nothing to too much trouble. I have a management meeting with Aidan and John Pulling every quarter and I contact my colleagues in the different COPFS Areas beforehand to see if there are any points that they want to raise. Usually there are no problems to report, just that the service has been excellent. It's a very easy contract to manage."
Gordon concludes: "As a government department we have to incorporate central government best value policy in all our operations. We identified that rationalising our in house printing and copying practice was one of the ways that we could do this and it has been very successful."
