2015-04-28 Planning and Organisation Committee Agenda

PLANNING & ORGANISATION COMMITTEE MEETING AGENDA                                   28 APRIL 2015


Once adopted, the Customer Service Charter will be communicated to all staff within Council
to reaffirm Council’s commitment of best practice customer service, with a view to constantly
maintaining the highest level of customer service across the organisation.

The charter will be available via Council’s website and hard copies will be available at
Council’s Customer Service Desks.

Attention is drawn to the opening times stated in the Charter for Council’s main
administration building. Currently, Council’s standard opening hours for telephone enquiries
are 8.15am to 5.00pm and 8.30am to 5.00pm for reception. This creates confusion for
customers and difficulties in design of staff rosters to cover the varying span of hours (span
of hours currently is 8 hrs. 45 min. for phones and 8 hrs. 30 min. for reception and counters).

The new Charter proposes the opening times for the customer service telephone lines to be
the same as reception. This time is common to many local governments. Current telephone
call numbers between 8.15am and 8.30am are low.

In relation to responses to requests for service or complaints, the aim is to respond to all
requests and complaints as effectively and quickly as possible and, where a response
cannot be provided immediately, the charter indicates a response will be provided within 10
business days. For more complex issues this may extend but an undertaking is given to
notify the customer in these circumstances and provide an estimated time for completion.

It is noted that a number of areas within the organisation operate to provide a faster level of
response. However, 10 business days is considered to be an acceptable standard and in
line with other local governments.

Previous Council Consideration

Nil

Finance & Risk

The Charter will give guidance to all areas of the organisation for its service delivery. Not
adopting a Customer Service Charter could lend to a risk of inconsistent service to the
community. The perception could be of a perceived failure from Council to meet the
community’s customer service expectation.

In addition, effective complaint handling and request for service systems are an important
aspect of Council’s risk management framework. If such systems are not effective, hazards
reported to Council may not be assessed efficiently or adequately leaving Council exposed
to a number of potential risks. Council’s T1 Request Management system addresses this
risk.

Consultation

External Consultation - Community & Stakeholder

Nil




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