Cloud-hosted council rates management system to improve the city
The City of Joondalup and Microsoft today announced the council has selected Microsoft Dynamics 365 and HCLTech’s Power Rates module to replace its on-premises core enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. The Western Australian local council will improve customer service by gaining a 360-degree view of its interactions with ratepayers, while increasing the reliability, scalability, and ease of use of its ERP system.
Like many councils around Australia, the City of Joondalup used an ERP solution from TechnologyOne to support operations such as rates payments and financial transactions, and help manage supply chains, service requests and human resources for its growing population. Starting in early 2020, the council engaged with Microsoft and its partner HCLTech to evaluate using Microsoft cloud technology to replace its core business system.
“When TechOne told us they were discontinuing on-prem support and moving everything to the cloud, we saw an opportunity to look at the bigger cloud picture,” said David Murnain, Manager of Information Technology at the City of Joondalup. “We wanted to provide a 360-degree view of each ratepayer and improve the ease of use for employees. In migrating to the cloud, we also wanted to increase the security and reliability of our platform, optimise our costs, and allow for scale as the population grew.
In July 2022, the council selected HCLTech to implement a holistic, end-to-end Dynamics 365 platform to replace its core business platform. Implementation began in November 2022.
The Cloud-based platform will be augmented by HCLTech’s Power Rates module, as well as incorporate over 20 discrete areas including the management of Pool inspections, Development approvals, Waste management etc. This will help the Council streamline many key areas of operation from rates to customer requests in a customer centric 360-degree view, which enables the teams to better and faster service the customer. The council will also roll out Microsoft 365 to 850 employees and look to move other critical workloads to the Dynamics 365 platform and Microsoft’s Azure cloud infrastructure.
“We’re delighted to support the City of Joondalup’s ambition to be the most innovative council in Australia and WA’s Silicon Valley,” said Mark Leigh, General Manager of Public Sector at Microsoft Australia, and New Zealand. “The choice of Dynamics 365 cloud technology will progress its vision of being a data-driven and customer-centric local government.”
As part of an exhaustive evaluation and tender process process consisting of many platforms as well as Microsoft partners, HCLTech carried out a comprehensive gap analysis over eight workshops to assess the council’s existing technology stack and the capabilities of the Microsoft platform. This provided the foundation for Microsoft and HCLTech to conduct a business value assessment with the council’s IT, customer service and finance teams to understand their needs and how Microsoft’s cloud technologies could be used to address them.
Joondalup is home to the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre, a partnership between the council, Edith Cowan University and North Metropolitan TAFE. It was nominated as one of Australia’s top 20 Smart City councils in Queensland University of Technology’s Smart Cities Down Under report in 2020.
As part of its strategic agreement with the City of Joondalup, Microsoft has committed to collaborate on projects that support the council’s diversity, cybersecurity, and sustainability priorities.
