Purpose

The demand for Orlo since it was introduced has grown particularly in the Contact Centre. An additional request for 15 additional ‘seats’ would have cost more than extending across the entire organisation with additional functionality. There will be additional demands through bus franchising and other initiatives. Additional functionality includes integration with CRM and Whatsapp – both of which we intend to make more use of for marketing and customer comms.

Decision

SYMCA to procure an additional 12 month extension to its contract with Orlo, comprising unlimited licenses spread across TSY/SYFTL and SYMCA Comms. The current budget for Orlo is £42,500 per year (split £10kpa SYFTL and additional amount split between TSY/Comms). This year’s new contract will increase to £55,000 per year with the additional amount split between TSY and Comms.

Alternative options considered

Orlo were appointed in 2024 onto the Crown Commercial Services framework G-Cloud 13. Having satisfied that Orlo can meet our requirements we were able to use the direct award option. After a recent user survey, we decided that Orlo was meeting our current needs and would need to be extended by 15 seats. Moving to a new platform would represent significant disruption at a time of widespread change which wouldn’t be ideal.