Technology for social justice
Infoxchange guides the SHIP
In 2011, homelessness in Australia means that every day almost 1 in 200 people in our community live without the fundamental human right – with no safe, secure or affordable housing. According to the Australian Bureau of statistics over 300 000 Australians experienced homelessness in 2010.
In July this year, a new secure web-based client management system called the Specialist Homelessness Information Platform (SHIP) was launched to support more than 1200 homelessness agencies across Australia.
The Commonwealth, in conjunction with the States and Territories, commissioned and funded the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) to develop the new system in partnership with Infoxchange Australia.
Developed and hosted by Infoxchange, the SHIP application assists agencies to report information to the new Specialist Homelessness Services collection and features a highly intuitive user interface allowing agencies to record client information including case notes, case plans and client goals.
The essential work of Homelessness agencies is being transformed by SHIP. "The new system means we’ll be able to better understand the causes of homelessness and see how individual clients move in and out of the homelessness system," says Senator Arbib, Minister for Social Housing and Homelessness.
The Infoxchange support team has guided the SHIP well, working consistently to provide a valuable telephone support service to over 6,000 users transitioning to the new system with ease and effectiveness.
Since the application went live in July, the SHIP support team has fielded over 4,600 calls, assisted agencies with the data migration process, developed resource materials for users, has updated the online user guide and is currently testing a new release of the application.
"SHIP is a fantastic program to manage the new federal data collection for the homelessness services. It has the added benefit of being a complete client management system which allows for us to seamlessly manage our client needs. It also provided a transparent team accountability in how we work with our clients," says Penelope from Melbourne City Mission.
The SHIP application will have a significant impact on how homelessness agencies across Australia collect data and will streamline the delivery of efficient and effective services to the community.
Find out more about SHIP.
Filed in:
Housing and homelessness