Outsourcing giant is now the main contractor for HM Passport Office’s contact centre and other business services after it was drafted in to help previous provider Teleperformance deal with backlogs
Serco has secured a £73.9m contract to provide an outsourced contact centre for the Home Office and other business services.
The outsourcing giant confirmed to PublicTechnology that it is now the main provider of contact-centre services for HM Passport Office, which is part of the Home Office.
Serco was drafted in to help previous HMPO outsourced provider Teleperformance deal with backlogs and poor-service issues three years ago.
Details of the firm’s new contract, which is due to run until February 2028, state that Serco will be responsible for providing customer-contact services to a range of Home Office customers.
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“These services will include, but are not limited to, telephony, webchat [and] email,” the contract description states.
The contract was a call-off from a framework agreement.
In addition to HMPO, supporting documents suggest the contract also includes services for UK Visas and Immigration and some Ministry of Justice services.
The schedule states that the service provided should be fully UK-based.
Other documents list staffing provider Adecco UK and contact-centre specialist Content Guru as key subcontractors.
Serco was tasked with assisting Teleperformance in dealing with a work backlog and poor service levels following a spike in passport applications after Covid rules were relaxed.
A National Audit Office report on HMPO’s problems said the organisation had prepared for 9.5 million passport applications in 2022 – 36% more than a normal year.
However, it said that, in May 2022 alone, HMPO received more than 1.2 million applications – 38% more than the highest month in any of the previous five years.
Limitations in processing applications digitally meant that more applications were required to be processed on paper, the NAO said, meaning tens of thousands of digital applications were moved to the less efficient, paper-based system.
It said media reports of delays had pushed more people to call the telephone helpline for reassurance, placing greater pressure on services.
