Hints and tips for local authority contact centres: improving customer services..
As one BBC reporter recently wrote “Knowledge is power - economic power - and there’s a scramble for that power taking place around the globe”.
The use of information has become increasingly important over the years within an organisation becoming increasingly reliant on turning this information into knowledge.
I recently attended an informal round table discussion with a number of local authorities yesterday who were talking about the issues that they were currently facing and sharing best practise. Surprisingly this time it was not about cost reduction or the budgets, it was about the real need to drive and improve customer services. They identified that gaining access to the information for their front line agents (regardless of how the member of the public / citizen had contacted them, whether face-to-face, email, web, via the phone) was really important as this actually did have a cost implication, particulary if members of the public had to repeatedly contact the council with the same query. Reducing the amount of avoidable contacts was not only good customer service from a business perspective it actually made sense. But I know that most of you here are not unfamiliar with channel shift and avoidable contacts! What did want to do was share the best practise from the group with you all…
One local authority talked through a few tips and one was very simple which was adding value; if within the call centre a member of the public had called in relation to wanting to renew a library book, the agent would take them through the process of doing this online (maybe talking them through how to do this themselve,s if they had access to a computer and the internet) thus resolving their issue and the reason for the call. However, before the end of the call the agent would say, “did you know?”…. and then go on to talk about did you know you can access the internet for free at the library and we can even provide you with free training on how to use the council systems, access a form, search the web, help you save money etc.
This simple principle of offering a ‘did you know?’ at the end of the call was there to make the citizen feel good after the call and give them some added value follow the resolution of their original issue. This was always related to the service that they were contacting about rather than just a mechanism for PR/information push to the citizen.
I can understand that there may be some objections to doing this simple task as it will make the call longer but it is all about customer service and making those citizens feel as if you care.
Other suggestions from the discussions included;
Sharing ideas and best practise on forums such as this one! COP for Public service or with neighbouring public service authorities not just local authorities. Are the Police, ambulance service etc having the same issues if so you may get economies of scale for the solution.
Categorising calls in a broad way such as;
Information failure
Process failure
Channel shift
Avoidable contact
Switchboard
Business as usual
Create ownership of the information within the organisation and allow people to update and amend this content (even upload to the website if they are responsible for public facing information).
Staff need to be able to fix issues so empower them to do so. Bring together a team of experts from the front line, who can meet informally and empower them to develop new processes that will reduce lengthy procedures (e.g. if a citizen requests a printed form, check to see if they can access this online and email them the form/url link so they can complete it or even help them to complete the form as they are on the phone/ during the face-to-face meeting. In the long run this will be cheaper than fulfilling a print/post option (and process these paper forms). The group needs to consist of those who have self-volunteered from different levels to assist the problem solving!
We have no affiliation to any of the links below, they are provided for reference purposes.
References:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-14949538
Best practise event was held by the Professional Planning Forum (http://www.planningforum.co.uk) at the Call Centre & Customer Services event (http://www.callcentre.co.uk/callcentreexpo/)
