Newry, Mourne & Down District Council (NMDDC) has selected Legend Club Management Systems as its new, one-step, single system registration, online booking and membership management solution as part of a wider initiative to improve the health and wellbeing of residents in the district.

Legend was awarded the contract following a comprehensive, competitive procurement process, whereby the council outlined all required specifications against which each supplier was scored for breadth of solution and ability to streamline the business moving forwards.

In addition, the council established an innovative framework agreement through a call off contract with Legend with pre-negotiated terms and conditions. This framework agreement will increase the accessibility and quality of health and leisure services across the country and break down barriers to public participation, by allowing other councils across the country to procure Legend and ensure innovation and adoption of best practice.

Following the merger of Northern Ireland’s 26 local authorities into 11 super councils in 2015 - the third largest of which is Newry, Mourne & Down District Council – the council recognised the need for a unified approach to give greater accessibility to its then disparate services and to gain the information it needed to make accurate, strategic decisions.

Kieran Gordon, Head of Indoor Leisure, Newry, Mourne & Down District Council, explains: “We had 14 sites across the district with different rates for the same activities, different memberships, individual means of bookings and non-identical pricing strategies. None of the systems were interoperable and there was no single database, which meant up to date, accurate business information was not available. Timely, accurate information was deemed vital for the new council in order to plan and develop our services in line with corporate objectives. We recognised that there was a huge opportunity to streamline the business with a single, ‘one-stop’ system, whilst improving the accessibility of our services through technology-driven innovation.”

Newry, Mourne & Down is working with Legend towards achieving a system that will provide the pathway to successful membership management.

Kieran Gordon comments, “We needed a system that would reflect and support the innovation we were looking to achieve and our ever changing business needs and demands. We are beginning to develop our online access options using Legend’s online & App functionality. The capability of these platforms both in terms of booking, joining and payment is extremely strong and offers us the opportunity to improve the customer journey. This should allow us to empower our front of house staff to deal with customer service queries whilst increasing access to newly standardised online services.”

In addition, Legend offers powerful Business Intelligence and Reporting functionality that will help to improve the Council’s pricing, membership strategies and service delivery in line with the needs of the citizens in the district.

Kieran commented, “We are looking forward to integrating these tools to enable us to deliver high standards of service across the district which will benefit everyone.”

Newry, Mourne & Down Distict Council’s Chairperson, Roisin Mulgrew, said, “The Council is giving its leisure facilities a new look and feel with the Be Active Campaign, promoting a healthy society and ensuring accessibility to everyone. The Council provides a vast range of activities for all ages and abilities to encourage an active and healthy lifestyle.”

Sean Maguire, Managing Director, Legend Club Management Solutions, comments: “We are delighted to have been selected as technology partner of choice for Newry, Mourne & Down District Council, and potentially other councils across Northern Ireland. We look forward to working with NMDDC to drive the highest levels of innovation and best practice in health and leisure service provision across the region.”