East Riding of Yorkshire Council is the largest authority, by area, in England, serving the needs of over 317,000 people. Its geographical spread demands a high-performance IT network infrastructure to deliver, respond to, and maintain public services.

Upgrade the pre-existing telephony solution to achieve one communications system across the organization, and seamlessly link branch offices and home-workers to the network and applications.

“More than anything else, we need a system that’s flexible,” said Paul Johnston, IT communications manager. “We can never know what’s around the next corner so need a communications platform that we can keep enhancing to meet whatever challenges are thrown at us.”

Use of MD110 IP extensions enabled East Riding of Yorkshire Council to establish solutions for its growing band of permanent home workers, and single occupancy/small branch sites. Previously, these could have been connected to the central telephony network by the use of remotely connected LIMs, the MD110 building blocks – a non cost-effective option for this kind of solution.

Ericsson BusinessPhone platforms positioned at a number of small branch sites connect via VoIP gateways to the MD110, enabling full accessibility to remote staff, and with full call functionality.

In parallel, the mobility needs of East Riding of Yorkshire Council employees have been innovatively countered by the use of MD110 Mobile Extension. “Ad hoc home workers, and senior staff on the move, derive substantial benefits from using Mobile Extensions.

Another key element that supports East Riding of Yorkshire Council's aspiration to make employees available at all times is unified messaging. “We adopted Ericsson’s OneBox at the beginning of 2004 and have been very impressed with the mobility it’s given us. Combining voice, email and fax, it fits alongside existing functionality in a very simple fashion and has proven to be a popular and productive tool for users.”

• Single corporate identity – all calls routed through centralized switchboard
  
• Full access to MD110 functionality for home workers and small branch offices
  
• Universal mobility from any device
  
• Unified messaging
  
• Greater productivity and flexibility
  
• Wireless VoIP connectivity for mobile library