The best customer experience project
At the heart of the Amplify Change programme is one simple question: how can we transform the council and transform the lives of our residents for the better? Answering this underpins everything we’re doing with the best customer experience project.
Right now, many of our customer services transactions take place over the phone and are handled individually by call handlers. This is time consuming for our customers and for our colleagues, too, particularly given many transactions can be managed online 24/7.
Making phone calls quicker and easier with automation
Just like when you contact your bank to make a payment or check your balance, you’re guided through options to get you where you need to be quickly and with the minimum of fuss. We’re all used to the automated model now, so it makes excellent sense for us to move to it too. Over the course of the project, we’ll work with transformation partners PwC to build a new, automated system to make phone transactions quick and easy for our customers at any time of day, starting with waste services and revenues and benefits, which receive the most customer calls.
Improving our online customer services
At the moment, customers are already able to make a claim for housing benefit and council tax support online and our plan is to develop this option even more and roll it out across more of our services. Our research has shown that, where this option is available and when people are able to, this is their preferred option most of the time.
More time to call and care for vulnerable residents
We know that there are customers who don’t have access to the internet or the ability to contact us this way. This group are very important to us and our customer services centre will remain open for at least 6 hours each weekday so that this option is still available. We’re also trialling longer opening one day week and will review this after three months. The new opening times will free up advisors for targeted outbound calling, identifying vulnerable customers and referring them to much-needed services.
Additionally, we have funding to extend our successful digital skills training for another three years, helping even more people with low digital skills to reap the practical and social rewards of digital literacy that go far beyond interacting with Shropshire Council.
The current model isn’t just time consuming – it’s also expensive
Did you know that, on average, a phone transaction costs £2.83, whilst a digital transaction costs just £0.15? By choosing the digital option, you’re saving the council money. Together, we’re all working to reduce the councils spend by £51 million this financial year. A greater use of digital services could help towards a £2.1m reduction in spend, all while providing a much better service to our residents.
Complex, sensitive contact will be dealt with by a trained adviser
Some parts of the customer service centre handle complex and sensitive issues for Shropshire residents, including adult social care requests and queries; concerns for children; risk of homelessness; or financial crises affecting families. Such inquiries will probably always require a dedicated, skilled advisor.
What next?
The first change we need to make is to the opening times of the customer services centre. From 21 August 2023, we’ll be open as follows:
- 9am – 6pm on Monday
- 9am – 3pm Tuesday to Friday
These new times mirror the times when the customer services centre receive the most calls, we know that far fewer calls are taken later on a weekday or on a Saturday.
A public consultation on these changes helped shape this decision. The later Monday opening times (from 3pm to 6pm) will be run as a trial and reviewed after 12 weeks to monitor usage.
This is just the first part of what will be a real, positive change: for customers, for vulnerable residents, and for the council as a whole.