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By Diane Leggo, Head of Tell Us Once Delivery Partnerships

Tell Us Once (TUO) often amazes people with its straightforward simplicity. It enables someone coping with a birth or death in the family to notify the relevant authorities in one fell swoop. Before TUO, people spent much time and money contacting up to 28 different authorities during a period of great upheaval. Thanks to TUO, they can spend this time with their families instead. When we tell people about it, the answer is often the same: “Why didn’t you offer this before?”

Behind this simplicity is a tale of perseverance, innovation and cross-governmental working.

TUO was first devised in 2004. Although initial reactions to it were positive, it took Sir David Varney’s 2006 report on transforming the service for customers to convince everyone that this should go ahead. After two years, work could finally begin. Our first lesson: never give up on a good idea.

This was a well-timed lesson, as we needed a positive attitude and perseverance to get us through the next stage. There were numerous government checks to pass through, whilst ensuring that we adhered to a series of government governance procedures. Of course, these checks and procedures are in place to ensure that our customers are being served in the best way possible, but as we all know, one needs time and patience to navigate them!

We were particularly pleased to survive the Cabinet Office – Efficiency Reform Group process. At a time when many programmes had to stop, we survived – a clear signal that the value of TUO had been officially realised.

The second lesson is hugely important. TUO has been designed in true collaboration with customers and local authorities (LAs). In our development phase, we listened to customers’ suggestions on how the service could improve and we acted upon them. This was no mere box-ticking exercise, but rather a valued opportunity to find out how we could best help our customers. As a result, take-up levels are already impressive: up to 95 per cent of customers in each participating LA are using the service.

From the outset, we knew that we had to work in partnership with LAs and other authorities in order to bring TUO to life. This simple service was complex to coordinate and this could only be achieved by abandoning the traditional approach, namely issuing a directive from Whitehall and expecting everyone to obey. Instead, we invited people to work with us and ensured that our governance structures reflected the equal interest of all partners for a successful outcome. Formalising the equality between central and local government in our governance structures consolidated our intentions to work with our partners.

Crucially, we also decided not to brand Tell Us Once, allowing LAs to give the service a title of their own choosing and to design their own brochures accordingly. Altogether, our approach encouraged LAs to work with us, with the result that 96 per cent of LAs will be offering the service by March 2012.

By working under the HM Government banner in partnership, local and central government have seen the benefits of providing the service. For example, early notification of a death ensures that overpayment of pensions, benefits and credits are not made. This avoids the need to undertake recovery procedures, whilst ensuring that the bereaved begin to gain the services they need. Through providing the service to over 60,000 customers we are already confident that the service delivers.

We can go further with TUO and we certainly intend to. There are more departments and more services to work with and new sectors to explore too. We will do this by continuing to learn as we grow and we are already excited by the possibilities ahead.