Trust saves £270,000 a year by improving telecommunication services

Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust now saves over £270,000 a year after making several changes to its telecommunications systems.

One of the biggest savings was made by changing our conference call supplier. By changing to a not-for-profit company called WhyPay, all of our conference calls cost the same as making a local landline call.

Other money-saving changes include:

• cancelling old landlines due to an increase in staff mobile use
• cancelling telephone book entries due to more and more people using Google to find our contact details
• replacing our Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) lines with the cheaper and more advanced Sessions Initiation Protocol (SIP) systems
• renegotiating contracts to find more cost-effective, efficient services.

Shane Cantwell, Network and Telecoms Manager for the Trust, said: "This has been a great initiative for the Trust. By making these changes, we've saved a significant amount of money and also made life easier for our staff.

"We've been watching the technological advances in telecommunications, and decided that we would move forward and use more innovative and streamlined ways of communicating. By using more conference call facilities, for example, our staff don't have to travel as much for meetings - so saving money by reducing travel costs, but also making life a bit easier for them."

Jason Dorsett, Chief Finance Officer for the Trust, said: "These changes are a great example of a team coming up with some simple ideas, making them happen, and them having a huge impact on the Trust. The team will carry on looking into what changes we can make to save money - sometimes even the simplest changes can make a significant difference over a year."