Integrated management system gives WYP an edge

West Yorkshire Police (WYP) has rolled out a new hi-tech management system a year ahead of schedule.

Originally planned to take two and a half years to complete, the implementation began on April 3, 2006 with phased geographical rollouts across nine divisions. Eighteen months later, the entire Niche Technology Records Management System (RMS) is now operational and being used by officers on the beat.

Superintendent Ray Dance, WYP’s Niche project director, said: “The system has already allowed us to identify critical information from the many records held on file.” He added that it would help deliver additional operational effectiveness and policing efficiency.

WYP police needed an integrated system to replace its six-silo legacy systems. The Niche RMS offered a unified platform plus the ability to link to the national Criminal Justice System (CJS).

The system provides improved business processes and data quality across the organisation. Features include complete records integration and search, easy data sharing between agencies and support for mobile reporting.

To facilitate WYP’s roll-out, preliminary staff training started in January 2006, with the service creating in-house training materials and sessions. A total of 8,000 officers and staff were trained on the new system.

WYP individually trained each of its nine divisions on the entire system, making training and business change manageable and a much lower risk. This helped the project team gain valuable knowledge in implementing, training and troubleshooting as it applied lessons from division to division.

Early divisions to go live are already experiencing advantages such as better research and information availability, including improved access to information about people, locations, vehicles and incidents being investigated. In addition, as each division received full training, personnel are able to move around within the service without requiring further training.

WYP is now sharing its expertise with other Niche users among the police service