TOWN Hall bosses hope to launch a new smartphone app to promote tourism and events in Tendring.

Tendring Council will embark on three schemes as part of a £865,000 digital transformation project over the next two years.

The authority is working with developers on a potential tourism and events app to be used at events throughout the year, including the ever-popular Clacton Airshow.

It is hoped the app could be used to bring together event income such as airshow donations and sponsorship and could be used to buy tickets for the council-run Princes Theatre in Clacton.

The project will also see a new integrated IT system introduced to join up the council’s major systems such as benefits, council tax, housing and planning with a new customer service system.

It means residents and businesses will only need to tell the council once of any change in circumstances and the information will be updated across all relevant departments. Carlo Guglielmi, councillor responsible for finance, said: “It is about using technology to improve performance and efficiency, and it is also about providing our residents and customers with digital self-service through a single council-wide access to services.

“This investment will deliver a step change improvement in our customer service.

“This will not replace face to face meetings, or telephone calls.

“The reliance on IT services is increasing all the time and as such we must ensure our IT infrastructure is robust enough and able to cope with the ever-increasing demand.

“With the app, it is right and proper we look further into the feasibility but it must be said the earning possibilities could be very substantial.”

A six-week feasibility study is being carried out with external consultants before a final decision will be made on taking the app project forward, without incurring any charges.

The third part of the digital transformation scheme, which was approved by the council’s cabinet on Friday, will see the authority move to a cloud-based data storage system using a Microsoft platform.

The change will reduce the ongoing capital costs of physical data storage, and replace it with annual costs of paying for the cloud storage.