The Royal Borough of Kingston-upon-Thames is the latest London Borough to go live with Cobalt's automated telephone payment service.

Provided under subcontract, as part of a ten year managed service contract primed by Civica, Cobalt will process all penalty notices payments offered to Kingston's parking department via the phone channel.

"Although we have worked with Civica on many other similar implementations this one is slightly special" said Cobalt's Service Delivery Manager, Alicia Sabat. "Kingston represents our first live integration to Civica's new Authority Traffic product, and judging by the volume of payments that we have processed in only the first few hours, it will be just as successful for Kingston, as it continues to be for the many other authorities that we support."

This latest win for Cobalt follows hot on the heels of other sales of Cobalt's telephone parking service made during the first quarter of 2005. These include contracts with local authorities such as the City of Bradford, Havant Borough Council and Thanet District Council, as well as County Parking Enforcement Agency in the private sector.


Notes to Editors

Cobalt's provision of automated telephone payment services to Kingston's parking department further confirms its leadership in this specialised niche. In total, Cobalt now provides notice processing services to 23 local authorities including 8 London Boroughs.

When recently independently surveyed, local authorities consistently said that they choose Cobalt for three things:

• the strength and depth of its specialised capabilities;
• the fact that it is easy to work with as a company; and
• its reputation for always providing a responsive, around-the-clock service both to them and the public that they serve.