South Perth council transforms digital services for residents

The City of South Perth became an early adopter of TechnologyOne’s digital platform to redefine how residents engage with the council.

A better design of government digital services can vastly improve user experience

As local governments have come under increasing pressure to transform how they serve their communities, the City of South Perth set itself the challenge to not only meet expectations, but to set a new benchmark for local government digital service delivery.

The city became an early adopter of TechnologyOne’s Digital Experience Platform for Local Government (DxP LG), a move that not only reshaped its internal operations, but redefined how residents engage with the council. DxP LG is designed to transform how councils engage with their communities, providing residents enhanced self-service capabilities and 24/7 access to council services.

“To become early adopters of DxP, although it involved a lot of work, it was quite an easy decision for us,” said Danielle Cattalini, the City of South Perth’s acting director of corporate services and manager of customer, comm-unica­tions and engagement.

The implementation allowed the city to position itself not just as a beneficiary of digital transformation, but also as a co-creator.

“As an early adopter, we could really influence and be part of that solution. It enabled us to get in at ground level and really make a difference that would be right for our community,” Ms Cattalini said.

The council already operated on TechnologyOne’s OneCouncil suite, and DxP LG acted as a natural extension of that system.

TechnologyOne specifically developed DxP LG to integrate seamlessly with its OneCouncil software, which is widely used across Australia. More than 73 per cent of Australian and New Zealand residents live in a council powered by TechnologyOne software.

The City of South Perth began its DxP LG journey by integrating the platform with its customer service team and knowledge base, ­allowing staff to familiarise themselves with the technology.

The adoption metrics so far are impressive: 100 per cent of telephone conversations and 97 per cent of emails are now captured in the system. Since taking DxP LG live to their community, more than 87,000 users have accessed the platform as guests, with 1800 residents registering for personalised services.

More importantly, the system has driven a significant increase in satisfaction, with feedback collected in real-time for every interaction.

“We now have great dashboards. We know where we are, any time, any place, any time of the day,” Ms Cattalini said. “Our knowledge base means our employees have access to the same information. It is a single source of truth.”

This ability to update information instantly in response to community feedback has also been transformative, empowering the city to make quick adjustments to ensure its platform reflects the most current and relevant information.

But one of the most meaningful changes has come through improvements in service delivery.

The city has refined its general request function, helping residents understand how to submit enquiries that are routed correctly the first time, speeding up response times.

“DxP enables us to have an overlay that is a lot more customer-focused and a lot more customer-friendly. People can find their own information without having to put in a request, without having to do anything else with us,” Ms Cattalani said.

The power of DxP LG lies in its scalability and forward-looking ­design.

As artificial intelligence and automation technologies are increasingly integrated into the platform, Ms Cattalini says she believes the benefits will only multiply. “What I am excited about is the expansion of what you can do across the board. That is where we’re going to see a real fundamental difference. It will just make it so much simpler and a lot more user-friendly, which is our aim: focus on customer experience,” she said.

This shift is important as residents’ digital literacy and expectations continue to rise. They want services on-demand, accessible from any device, without having to navigate bureaucratic red tape.

“Customers are expecting more and more. But they also want that human element.” Ms Cattalini said.

“DxP enables us to provide better, more personalised experiences.”