Customer Care Standards Procedure April 2016
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1. Customer Care Standards
The Parish Council want to deliver excellent customer services and continue to improve. Residents and community views help to shape our priorities. We listen and respond to what you tell us. Our customers need to know what standard of service to expect no matter what service is being delivered or where it is being delivered in the Parish.
Telephone calls
We will answer your call in a courteous and professional manner
Our staff will give you their name and the place you are calling
We will offer to call you back when we cannot respond to your query immediately
if the service you call is not the appropriate service to help with your enquiry, we will make sure we put you in touch with the relevant person
Two important measures of our call handling performance are:
The percentage (%) of calls we answered within 20 seconds
The percentage of abandoned calls (A customer abandons a call when they hang up before an advisor is able to answer) – our target is 10% or less
Written communication
When you write to us:
We will send you an acknowledgement within five working days if a full response is not possible within ten workings days
Letters which require a response from another service area will be sent on to the relevant area within 5 working days
The council has a statutory obligation to respond within twenty working days to requests dealt with under the Freedom of information Act 2000 process
Face to face communications
Visitors will be greeted by a receptionist within five minutes of arriving at reception. If we need to ask a colleague to deal with your enquiry, unless the person you wish to speak to is not available, you will wait no more than fifteen minutes. You will:
Be greeted in a courteous and helpful manner
By a member of staff wearing an identity badge
Be given any information requested during the visit or given an explanation of why information of the person you wish to speak to is not available at the time of the visit, and when they will be available.
Other procedures
There is also a statutory procedure for handling complaints
Procedures which explain how your compliments, comments and complaints will be dealt with under these regulations are available.
Customer Care Standards Procedure April 2016
Page 2 of 2
When you email us
We will send you an acknowledgement within two working days if a full response is not immediately possible
We will send a full response to email complaints within fifteen working days
Emails that require a response directly from a service area will be sent to the relevant service within 5 working days
When we reply to you
We will tell you:
Who is dealing with the issue
The name and contact number for queries
What is being done
What will happen and by when
If we are unable to provide a full reply within these timescales, we will let you know why and when you can expect a full response
