Sheffield City Council extends backoffice outsourcing contract with Capita in £170m deal

Capita extends "transformation partnership" with Sheffield City Council by a further six years in deal worth £140m-£170m

Sheffield City Council has extended its seven-year "transformation partnership" with Capita, which saw much of the Council's backoffice functions outsourced to Capita in 2009, by a further six years.

It means that Capita will continue to manage a core range of backoffice services on behalf of the council, including IT, council tax collection, housing benefits, human resources, and payroll and financial business transactions.

The extension will start from January 2016 and the deal will bump up Capita's revenues by between £140m and £170m.

Capita claims that it will also provide "additional business change capacity", working in partnership with the Council to define and deliver projects designed to raise revenue and save money. Capita says that it and the Council have identified the potential to generate significant additional savings for the Council over the life of the extended contract.

In a statement, Capita CEO Andy Parker said: "The extension of Capita's partnership with Sheffield City Council reflects our commitment to build on our strong working relationship, and to deliver further significant transformation in the way services are provided by the Council. This extension will enable the Council to benefit from Capita's wealth of experience and its capacity to drive innovation and change."

New developments in the next contract may include a more comprehensive bring your own device (BYOD) policy, which Council CIO Paul Green told Computing in 2012 the organisation was considering, but was "slap bang in the middle" of the contract with Capita and had therefore adopted a wait-and-see approach.