About the project
When the UK went into lockdown in March 2020 in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, Citizens Advice Manchester went from supporting 140 people in one location to supporting 140 people in 140 locations. The VOIP system it was using in its office didn’t handle home-based working as well as expected, so it needed to come up with a new solution very quickly. Because staff were already using Google Workspace running on Chromebooks, the organisation was able to quickly and easily switch to Google Voice, a browser-based softphone solution that’s available as part of Google Workspace. Within a day of speaking to Ancoris and Google and agreeing a contract, Citizens Advice Manchester had staff making and receiving calls using Google Voice. As well as solving this immediate need, Google Voice provides greater flexibility and is simpler and easier to manage.