Word360 wins large NHS translation support contract
Birmingham-based translation firm Word360 is celebrating several new contract wins.
The company will now be responsible for delivering interpretation and translation support services across the majority of NHS trusts in the West Midlands.
The team have won key contracts with Birmingham and Solihull CCG, and the Birmingham Women 's and Children 's NHS Foundation Trust.
Word360 will be supporting all GP practices across Birmingham and Solihull, enabling staff to support patients through on-demand digital services, such as telephone and video interpreting.
This means Word360 has become the largest interpreting and translation company in the Midlands, having delivered nearly 250,000 sessions in the last 12 months alone.
Word360 provides a full suite of multilingual communication support, meaning every time one of its clients wants to communicate in a different language, they have instant access technology on-hand combined with a network of qualified professionals to make the most of it.
Telephone and video interpreting services have been crucial in enabling government and healthcare organisations to support their service users and patients.
Chief commercial officer, Kavita Parmar said: “The recent Afghan crisis has highlighted the importance of language support in particular, and Word360 have been integral in supplying organisations with professional interpreters in Dari and Farsi. ”
“We have taken a particular focus to help our NHS clients to take a digital first approach that we offer a better service to patients but also save them money in the process.
“We invest a lot of time in training staff to know what to do when they have a deaf patient or if someone doesn 't speak English. This ensures that everyone can access NHS services whenever they need them.
A real game-changer for the business has been the investment in new technologies.
Kavita Parmar adds: “The directors have made a £1 million investment in developing their proprietary platform, Wordskii, that will now be available to all organisations who have a need for multilingual communication support.
“The aim of the system is to support anyone who has a one-off language requirement right through to a large organisation who need a regular fully managed service. ”
To support the increase of clients, Word360 have doubled their workforce over the last 12 months to 30 in-house staff, and a global network of over 9,800 linguists.
They have also seen a major increase in business from the US - and the firm now plans to open a new office Stateside in 2022.