The Service Improvement & Project Manager introduced the report which set out the details of the full review of the Customer Access Strategy and the formulation of the new strategy.

The Chair invited Members to make comments and these included:

·         Appeared to be some missing text in the last paragraph at the bottom of page 171;

·         considered the Council’s website needed improvements;

·         welcomed the report, but there were too many photographs in it taking up space;

·         considered lead officer titles be included, not names;

·         suggested that residents’ names did not need to be included when they reported an issue;

·         the report was very extensive and welcomed the community involvement and the voices of residents had been listened to;

·         surprised with the figure of 98% of people having access to a computer or phone;

·         not everyone needed face-to-face connection and were happy to use their computer or phone to interact;

·         referring to the Equality Impact Assessment (EIA), there was ‘none’ registered on the Relevance to decision column for Sex, but there had been a 66% response from women, and considered this should be reflected as ‘medium’;

·         considered there needed to be a variety of ways that members of the public could report an issue;

·         Customer Service Centre (CSC) staff were very knowledgeable;

·         considered some of the actions on the Action Plan should already be actioned in any case;

·         clarification sought on the dates within the Action Plan;

·         amendment needed to the name of the councillor at the bottom of the Foreword section;

·         considered the Action Plan to be quite vague and residents probably would want to see in more detail the planned improvements;

·         there was no feedback from the Area Committees within the report;

·         chatbots should be used to help direct residents;

·         suggested a call-back option be offered;

·         digital chats so that more people could be dealt with at a time;

·         considered two years to achieve ‘high priority’ was too long;

·         the CSC email address needed to be shared;

·         residents should be able to book face-to-face appointments with the CSC;

·         suggested the introduction of an app; and

·         an annual report was important, especially to see how the actions had ‘bedded in’.

Officers responded to some of the points raised.  The Service Improvement & Project Officer confirmed that he would update the EIA to reflect women as ‘medium’.  The Director of Resources referring to the Action Plan said that any transformation work had a long lead in time and took up a lot of resource and could not be achieved quickly.  The Service Improvement & Project Officer said that the Council was doing as much as it could within its resources.  The Head of Housing & Community Services added that there was a programmed approach and some might be achieved earlier than the dates outlined, with some already being completed, and it was a work in progress.

Councillor Jayes moved the following motion:  That there be an annual progress report on the Action Plan.  This was seconded by Councillor Baldock and on being put to the vote the motion was agreed.

Further comments included:

·         Referring to the responses document (Appendix IV), considered some of the sample responses captured the customer experience quite well;

·         it was important to reduce the amount of follow-up to an issue by supplying more feedback/updates;

·         it was important that online forms were user-friendly so they were used;

·         the Council website was not necessarily poor, but the search engines often gave outdated information;

·         referring to the LGR and the changing status of the Council, it was still important to have an up to date policy, for both the present and to carry forward; and

·         suggested the customer responses be condensed to fewer pages.

Councillor Hannah Perkin proposed the recommendations and these were seconded by Councillor Baldock.

Resolved:

(1)      That a new Customer Experience Strategy be introduced in place of the former Customer Access Strategy to match service delivery with trends in customer demands and resources.

(2)      That the proposed action plan be noted.

(3)      That delegated authority be given to the Director of Resources and the Director of Regeneration and Neighbourhoods, to take relevant actions to facilitate the required transformation activities.

(4)      That there be an annual progress report on the Action Plan.