Head of Support Services for INPS, Phil Doyle, has cut down travel costs and improved collaboration with his front line support team, product development and other key areas of the business. Phil says, “In a VuCall meeting I can be more involved and control it better because I get the visual clues and it is much easier to hear what is going on.”
INPS is part of the French company CEGEDIM, itself a global organisation providing information technology based services to the health sector in over 80 countries. In the UK, INPS is best known for its Vision clinical system that is used in over 95% of UK primary care trusts and health boards.
After using the VuCall hosted video meetings service for over a year, INPS has been able to cut down on travel costs and also improve collaboration in teams working on product development, customer training, support and sales. INPS like many high technology companies has many teleworkers throughout the United Kingdom as well as offices in London, the Midlands, and Scotland.
Phil Doyle is the Head of Support Services for INPS and is himself a teleworker based in Cumbria. Phil is a strong advocate of video meetings and uses VuCall as both an essential tool for his mobile office and for regular communication with his team of 62 people in customer support in Battersea, London.
Phil and his team have found it such a great boost to their ability to work productively at a distance that they have installed a dedicated system in their Helpdesk Meeting Room at Battersea.
Since swapping his office base for teleworking Phil has been a regular user of audio conferencing but has found it restrictive. As he says, “VuCall technology works much better than an audio conference. I have never had a successful audio conference because I cannot see the other people and sometimes cannot even hear them! The audio tends to be muffled if they aren’t sitting near the conference phone.” And the lack of visual and audible clues leads to a breakdown in the communication essential to the meeting. It leads to questions such as: Is that comment addressed to everyone? Is it a side conversation?
“With VuCall I can see when people are paying attention. We all know what happens on audio conferences. Mobile phones are a distraction and people turn on mute and do emails. In a VuCall meeting I can be more involved and control it better because I get the visual clues and it is much easier to hear what is going on.”
Phil manages the front lint line support desk and second line support department and is regularly in touch with the 4 managers and 4 team leaders. He also regularly uses VuCall with the product development teams. Phil’s team provides external technical support to the user base in primary health care. Their role can be trouble shooting, to be the focal point of fixing things when they go wrong. INPS provides a hosted solution to many customers and Phil says, “If the hosting system goes down, I need to join meetings internally to progress fixing the problem as quickly as possible.” VuCall is also useful for problem solving meetings. “I can get a group of people together and brainstorm solutions to problems. We pull in developers from downstairs, my guys, and second line guys all in a room. Just like being there. I prefer to do it that way. That’s what I use it (VuCall) for all the time.”
Like all managers Phil needs to track and report statistics about the performance of his department. But as Phil says, “I don’t need to be in the office for that. I can schedule a meeting a few days before the monthly service review. I use it (VuCall) for keeping in touch in preference to phoning. Because I can see faces I can gauge reactions not just by the tone of voice but also by their expressions. I find it much easier.”
Phil describes himself as comfortable with the technology and a willing early adopter. He said that having tried VuCall he has seen the benefits and will continue to use it. In hard cash terms he says, “It has saved me travelling to the office twice a month, a saving of £500-600 every month for this purpose alone.” And as he points out, large meetings can be very expensive costing in excess of £3,000 without even allowing for the loss of productive time travelling to and from the meeting. “The same money invested in IT infrastructure would pay returns time and time again instead of one off.”
Looking ahead Phil would like to extend the use of VuCall to meetings he needs to have regularly with external bodies in the NHS and with other business units of CEGEDIM. The roll out of EPS2 (electronic prescribing) for example will mean INPS will need to work closely with CEGEDIM management in Lancashire and Surrey. Phil sees great collaborative and cost saving benefits by linking VuCall with the existing Polycom systems at those locations.
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