Filenet proves big saver for Auckland City

By ADAM GIFFORD

The Auckland City Council has paid off its investment in a Filenet-based land titles management system in less than 18 months.

Information technology manager Ian Rae said the cost of the core Filenet software for 75 concurrent users was $220,000, not including design and the cost of converting paper records into digital data.

More than 750,000 documents, or 25 per cent of active files, have been digitised so far.

"Some of the savings that contribute to the return on investment include $180,000 a year on microfilming ... and $150,000 a year in staff costs," Rae said.

A report from implementation partner KPMG Consulting said the council had halved the cost of processing building permits.

Both have just finished integrating Filenet into a workflow application which allows staff to manage the regulatory process.

Rae said customer satisfaction had increased 25 per cent since the system went live.

Auckland City's Environments department processes 19,000 permit applications each year for buildings, and 5000 licensing applications.

It holds files relating to 160,000 sites, amounting to 11 million paper documents and 4 million microfilm and aperture card records.

The success with Filenet is in contrast to Land Information New Zealand, which uses the American-made technology as part of its $150m Landonline electronic registry but which has so far failed to speed up title processing.