GLOUCESTERSHIRE HOSPITALS NHS TRUST

Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust was faced with a major internal re-organisation in 2002 with all hospitals within the county merging to form one NHS Trust. This presented Pat Mooney, the Trust's Telecommunications Manager with a real challenge. The existing call handling system was at almost full capacity. With the merger of telephone systems within the Trust, conflicts were set to arise with some number duplication across hospitals. Following the merger one single phone number was also needed for the sake of simplicity. The Trust provides a comprehensive range of general acute hospital services to 500,000 people, managing up to 6,000 inbound calls each day. A variety of options were considered from 0870 national to 0800 freephone numbers, before deciding upon a dedicated 0845 local rate number.

Totem realised a system adapted entirely for Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust. The system implemented, an automated answering service, provided a faster, cheaper way of answering the 6,000 daily inbound calls. The system welcomes callers and, should they not know the number required, advises them to speak the name of the person/department needed, they are then transferred directly. Thus relieving pressure on switchboard, who previously spent much of their time answering and transferring calls, enabling callers who need switchboard's skills to be helped faster.

"Totem forced us to really look at what we needed and challenged us every step of the way. The result is a faster, cheaper more efficient system that really works for our callers and for the Trust", according to Pat Mooney, Telecommunications Manager, Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust.

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