Odyssey Interactive launches Intranet solution designed specifically for Charities

Odyssey Interactive has launched Interact Charity Edition, an Intranet solution designed specifically to meet the needs of charitable organisations. A key new feature of the solution is its pricing plan, which offers charities a percentage discount on their intranet package, a free module of their choice and also a free 30-day trial of all of Interact’s additional feature modules.

Charities are often aware of the concrete and measurable business benefits that an Intranet would bring to their organisation, but often find it difficult to justify spending money upfront on software. The Interact Charity Edition addresses this issue by making Interact available at a reduced cost basis and offering a free additional module, simultaneously easing the financial burden and ensuring maximum functionality.

The try-before-you-buy element to the Interact Charity Edition allows organisations to try out all additional Interact modules, from expense management to holiday booking packages. Charities will be able to evaluate the benefits individual modules bring to their business operations and optimise their Intranet accordingly, with none of the financial commitment.

A key advantage of Interact is that it is a self-managed system. Interact’s simple interface allows for decentralised content management, meaning that business managers and field staff take control of the content, ensuring it is relevant and up-to-date and simultaneously reducing the burden on IT staff.

Key features of the Interact Charity Edition include the SMS module - an important way to communicate key messages with users who are involved in community work or external community events. Another useful resource provided by Interact Charity Edition is to ensure people have read important documents, such as child protection policies, best practice policies and health and safety documents.

Nigel Danson, Director of Odyssey Interactive said: "Many organisations still distribute and share their information using paper-based reports that very often don't get read or rapidly become obsolete -- leading to a disorganised administrative and knowledge system. The most efficient way to solve these problems is to create an Intranet, which will provide many benefits, both in terms of increased efficiency and reduced costs.

"Interact Charity Edition ensures more streamlined business operations. It has been specifically designed to meet the often complex needs of a charitable organisation, enabling large volumes of information to be communicated effectively across an organization and helping field staff and fundraisers to remain in contact with central office."

Charities have a vast range of information to communicate to both staff and trustees, ranging from operational guidance issues and government documents as well as paper-based processes such as stringent expenses management. This can become expensive and time-consuming.

Interact Charity Edition reduces these costs by ensuring communication is efficient, even when people are working from many different locations, and therefore helps to improve the governance, accountability, efficiency and effectiveness of charities. Interact’s additional modules create an Intranet which delivers your specific objectives.

Odyssey Interactive works with a number of charitable organisations and companies in the voluntary sector, and has designed and installed Intranets for companies such as the Royal Academy of Dance, the British Film Institute, BMS World Mission, the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts and the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.