By Dan Ilett, 28 November 2005 17:00
NEWS
Lancaster City Council has opened a new call centre in a bid to reduce the number of abandoned customer calls to its offices.
The move follows research conducted among 1,000 local residents, 80 per cent of whom said they prefer to contact the council by phone and have queries resolved by the first point of contact.
Jane Allder, head of information systems at Lancaster City Council, said: "The percentage of service calls abandoned by citizens has fallen from 30 per cent to only four per cent as a result of the centre opening.
"[It] makes it far easier to identify who owns what tasks, how many calls are awaiting action and whether service levels are being achieved. This enables us to plan for the future with much greater confidence."
The contact centre employs five people who each day receive up to 300 calls about contract issues such as bins, litter and abandoned vehicles.
A further survey of 200 callers to the centre found that almost all (99.5 per cent) were satisfied with the way their calls were handled.
Because of this, the council has decided to expand the number of services the centre offers.
The move comes as the government recently announced in its IT strategy that it would scale down 130 call centres throughout the UK.
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