Annex A
RESTRICTED—POLICY
On 29 June 2004, you received information about
the modernisation programme for the Department for Work and Pensions
and we promised to keep you informed of any further developments.
As part of the modernisation, we are carrying out a series of
boundary changes to our existing clusters in Local Service. This
is an internal management change to achieve a better distribution
of work and provide better alignment with local authority boundaries.
The new structure will facilitate referrals
and partnership working and enable us to deliver a more efficient
service to older people. Re-clustering will not in any way impact
on our commitment to Joint Teams that remain our long-term aim
for service delivery.
In the longer-term, there may be a possible
change in the names of Local Service contacts that you work with
at a local level but in the meantime, these will remain the same.
We shall keep you informed throughout and we will let you know
when any changes occur. For customers, re-clustering will be an
invisible process. They will continue to contact the pension centres
in the usual way and referrals will take place as normal.
This process will take place over the next few
months and we expect the final structure to be in place from October
2004. I would like to reassure you that The Pension Service remains
fully committed to working in partnership with [DN—insert
name of local authority] in the service of our joint current
and future customers.
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