Her Majesty’s Customs and Excise (HMC&E) is one of the United Kingdom’s oldest government departments. Over the centuries it has had to be flexible enough to adapt to constant political and economic change. Now, the department is furthering its flexibility by embracing Indigo Digital Offset Color technology. The printing facility of HMC&E, based near Southend in Essex, has recently become the first UK government department to install an Indigo press, opting for the new high quality Platinum. Harry McGivern, Print and Paper Handling Service Manager, comments, "After considering various other products, the Platinum was the obvious choice. The key reasons for the purchase were the Platinum’s reliability and the ability to print on a wide range of substrates. The Platinum will, additionally, improve the quality and capacity of our in-house color printing." Platinum’s print quality is enabled by a new laser writing head development called Image Tracking Technology (ITT). This breakthrough capability enables the imaging lasers to precisely lock onto the surface motion of the Photo Imaging Plate (PIP), creating high resolution images and highly uniform tints and solids. Digital printing is not new at HMC&E. For the last 20 years the in-house main-frame has been used as a source of variable data for mailings to the UK’s 1.8 million VAT traders. HMC&E’s Platinum is equipped with electronic collation and Yours Truly Personalization, to further maximize its potential and functionality. Additionally, the press will use PANTONE 288 as a spot color – HMC&E’s corporate blue. "The current audience for the Platinum is around 22,000 staff dispersed nationally between three HQs and numerous offices. The press’s main areas of activity will be Outlook, our personalized union newsletter, as well as various training manuals, board reports, business cards, just-in-time work and numerous other smaller specialized publications for specific departments," explained Harry McGivern. Currently, all digital printing is to satisfy in-house demand. However, if demand continues to increase at its present rate, Harry is convinced that another, higher capacity Indigo press may be needed in the near future. The facility may eventually take external contracts for color work on the Platinum. This will be facilitated under the Government’s Wider Markets Initiative, which encourages the public sector to make the most effective and efficient use of public assets. Harry concludes, "Over the past five years we have gradually developed our in-house color printing facility. With the installation of Indigo’s state-of-the-art Platinum, we feel confident in meeting our internal customers demand for cost effective, high quality, full color publications, and are well-positioned to take external contracts if opportunities arise."