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Durham's contact centre for social care services, Social Care Direct, is an innovation which other departments around the country are keen to emulate. The service was introduced two and a half years ago as part of a reorganisation of adult social services in the county and is proving highly effective.

Staff take over 300 calls a day and accept referrals directly on behalf of all 47 of the county's specialist social care teams.

So whenever someone in Durham wants to contact a social worker about a new case, they now ring Social Care Direct. The contact centre receives about 75 referrals a day which are electronically allocated to the relevant social services team, 99 per cent of them on the day they come in. Contact centre staff follow up urgent cases with a phone call to make sure the allocation has been received.

The team of 24 includes both social workers and unqualified but highly trained first contact officers. Bob Morland, contact centre manager says: "First contact officers can take referrals on most issues, but if it's child protection, adult abuse, mental health or a complex case they will pass it over to a qualified social worker. The bulk of callers are redirected internally, given advice or signposted to another agency. We also have information we can send out to people about whatever their concern relates to."

The benefits of Social Care Direct include quicker responses to referrals - the county is, for example, rarely fined for delayed hospital discharges - and a more consistent service for "customers" - as they are known in Durham. Another advantage is extended hours. "People can ring up after work if they are worried about an elderly relative, and GPs will often phone after the surgery closes and offload all their cases at once. It provides flexibility for customers making referrals as well as a smoother service internally."

Following his appointment in August 2002, Morland had just six months to turn the shell of an office into an operational contact centre. This included appointing and training staff, purchasing equipment, developing data flows and procedures for making referrals, and generally preparing for the contact centre. As an ex-navy man, Morland also had to contend with scepticism from staff who didn't quite believe he could manage the service effectively without having any experience in social care.

Social Care Direct went live in February 2003. At first, Morland and his team were unprepared for the sheer volume of calls. "We were a victim of the success of our advertising campaign. We were being used as a telephone exchange and a directory inquiry service." Morland, with county hall support, dealt with the problems by persuading social workers to give out their telephone numbers to clients and customers and appointing more staff. "We tackled the problem quite quickly, but there's no doubt that we lost the confidence of some GPs and other professionals because they couldn't contact us as quickly as they would have liked."

Despite the early hiccoughs, Morland believes the service is now respected by customers and staff alike. "People tell us they don't know how they would manage without Social Care Direct. We have regular independent reviews of customer satisfaction and we always do very well."


The service has also been evaluated by the government's Improvement and Development Agency and came out with flying colours. "We were found to be very effective and efficient overall. We're one of the few contact centres deemed to be operationally successful. Several councils have been up here to see how we do things."

After 34 years' service in the Royal Navy, Morland admits to feeling like a fish out of water when he arrived in his new job. "Everything happens quickly in the armed services. It has to - a warship without communications is a £200 million piece of junk. Things are a bit slower in a local authority and I've had to get grips with that."

But perhaps the biggest shock for Morland was learning about the sheer scope of a social worker's caseload. He observes ruefully, "I've been to some terrible places in the world and seen some horrible things, but I believed we still lived in this green and pleasant land."

TOP TIPS

• Be straight with people and deal with criticism head-on.
• Be quick to acknowledge mistakes - and learn from them.
• Strip away the emotion and look for the root cause of the problem; the solution will stare you in the face.

RUBBISH TIPS

• Keep a cynical detachment - just in case it doesn't pan out.
• Underestimate demand - it will take ages before people start using the service.
• If things go wrong find someone or something to blame.

Curriculum Vitae
Name: Bob Morland.
Job: Manager of Social Care Direct, Durham Council.
Last Job: Lieutenant Commander, managing naval  communications centre.
First Job: Radio operator,  Royal Navy.
Qualifications: Institute of Management Diploma level five; Dartmouth and Greenwich  Naval Colleges.