Customer Excellence
Charter
  1. Executive Summary

Six Town Housing is committed to continuous improvement in the quality of our service and the way that our customers, can access our services.

We are therefore committed to becoming an organisation whose cornerstone of achievement will be excellence in customer care.

The following Customer Care Charter outlines the way in which we will continually seek to deliver excellence in customer care in the following key areas:

Face-to face contact with our customers

Telephone contact

Dealing with written correspondence

Handling complaints

Maintaining confidentiality

Managing the safety of our customers and our employees

Providing for customers with different needs

Keeping customers informed and listening to their views

In seeking to achieve excellence in customer care, we will

  • Provide an excellent service for our customers quickly and efficiently
  • Treat everyone fairly and courteously according to their needs
  • Recognise the diversity in our community and ensure that all of our tenants/ residents benefit from our services
  • Continually train and develop the skills of our staff in terms of customer care, quality and diversity
  • Ensure that we value the contribution of our staff and link it back to a robust performance management system
  • Consult with our customers, learn from their views and keep them informed about our standards and achievements
  • Monitor our achievements against our standards and publish the results
  • Welcome comments and complaints and respond in an open, proactive and constructive way
  • Adapt a culture of continuous learning from best practice

Section One –Delivering Excellent Customer Service

Standard

We are committed to meeting the needs of all our customers by providing accessible, high-quality services. We will respect people’s privacy, dignity, religious and cultural beliefs.

First impressions are all important. From the first contact with our customers we will:

  • Greet customers in an appropriate way and be polite at all times
  • Treat all customers the way we would expect to be treated ourselves
  • Identify ourselves, take responsibility for our actions and make time

for the customer

  • Listen carefully, and make sure we understand what has been said

and check back with the customer

  • Use an appropriate method of communication to respond promptly

and positively to the needs and expectations of the customer

  • Adapt and respond effectively to different customer needs
  • See customers within five minutes of appointment times
  • Apologise if there is a delay and offer customers a choice of waiting

or making another appointment

  • Explain to customers if there is a breakdown in service and keep

customers informed

  • Respond in a straightforward way when we cannot meet a customer

request –and give reasons

  • Work with others (as a team) to discuss options suited to customers’

needs - keeping solutions simple

  • Open at times that are suitable for the majority of our customers

Our reception staff will:

  • Be trained in all aspects of customer service
  • Look smart and wear the identity badge with the Six Town Housing logo
  • Know their own service area and be aware of the wider range of

services that we provide

  • Signpost customers to where necessary
  • Be prepared and ready to serve customers when the reception desk

or workstation opens

  • Be aware of their limitations and not make promises they cannot

deliver.

Our Reception area will:

  • Be clearly signposted
  • Be clean, tidy, well lit, warm and ventilated with comfortable seating,
  • Have toys and books for young children
  • Clearly display our office opening hours and the out-of-hours emergency telephone number
  • Display copies of our aims and objectives
  • Be accessible to people using wheelchairs (and have counters at
  • wheelchair height)
  • Provide up-to-date information, available in large print, on audio

tapes and in other languages if no other alternative

  • Provide interview room facilities so that customers can speak to us in private, if required. We will visit customers at home if they prefer.
  • Provide a private free phone in reception and Council Information Points so that customers can speak to staff or departments free of charge
  • Provide a portable hearing loop
  • Display our service standards

Dealing with customer enquiries:

  • Be polite and helpful, offer a friendly service and treat customers with respect
  • Be trained to deal with customer enquiries and answer any questions they may have. If unable to do this straight away, arrange an appointment for the customer to see the appropriate person, refer the customer to the relevant organisation or contact the customer once the correct information has been obtained. Normally, we will do this within 24 hours of receiving the customer enquiry
  • Wear name badges in the office and carry identification when visiting customers in their home.
  • We will not accept abusive, violent behaviour or harassment towards staff or other customers
  • Treat any information customers give us in confidence
  • Respect customers’ privacy and confidentiality
  • If appropriate, provide a private interview area or room
  • Provide access to a freephone for enquiries about our services or services provided by the council
  • Use language line or arrange for an interpreter/sign-language interpreter, if customers need one
  • Provide ‘Making A Difference leaflet’ for customers who want to record any

compliments, complaints, comments and suggestions.

Visitors

You must let reception staff know when you are expecting visitors so that they can:

  • Deal with visitors in a polite and welcoming way
  • Give them a visitor pass if they need to access secure areas
  • Arrange for person they are visiting to meet them at reception
  • Collect visitor passes from them when they leave the building.

Security

  • If you see anyone not wearing an ID badge or visitor pass, you must

let your manager know immediately.

  • Reception areas will have appropriate levels of security, including

panic alarms.

Monitoring

Observations by managers through performance reviews

Appoint ‘mystery shoppers’ to report back on the quality of the service.

Assess satisfaction levels using customer comments and surveys.

Section Two - Dealing with phone enquiries

Answering phones is everyone’s responsibility

Standard

We will make sure that we answer all phone calls promptly, politely and within 20 seconds and in line with agreed Customer Service quality monitoring standards.

We will:

  • Aim to answer all incoming calls promptly and within twenty seconds
  • Use our recommended greeting, which includes saying:

Welcome/Good morning (or afternoon)

Six Town Housing (outside calls)

Your section, and

Your name

  • Apologise if there has been a delay in answering a call
  • Speak clearly to avoid any misunderstanding and respond in a polite

and professional way

  • Take responsibility for calls and make every effort to deal with them -

be as helpful and informative as possible

  • Make sure you know how to use the phone system and have an

understanding of the work of different sections and departments

  • When transferring calls, check that the caller is through to the

appropriate person before hanging up

  • If unable to deal with an enquiry immediately, let the caller know

that we will give a reply as soon as possible and by whom

  • Only put a caller on hold if absolutely necessary but when you do,

you should check back regularly to apologise and make sure the

caller knows you have not forgotten them

  • Make sure you have a pen, message pad and access to phone lists or

the on-line directory

  • Take clear messages which give the time, date, caller’s name, phone

number your name and any other relevant information

  • Make sure you pass messages on to the person they are intended for

so that they can be dealt with by the next working day

  • Strive to ensure telephone calls are answered in your

absence, for example, by transferring them to other colleagues

  • Set your phone to forward to another extension when engaged or if

there is no answer

  • Have guidelines on how to deal with ringing phones while dealing

face to face with customers

  • Arrange for Language Line or a Translator to be made available to translate on your behalf.
  • Promote the use of the contact centre by issuing all customers with our 0161 686 8000/0808 144 5368numbers and not direct lines.

Answerphones

Answerphones often annoy people, so our policy is to not make them available to staff who deal directly with customers on a daily basis. If you have answerphone facilities

You will:

  • Make sure the answerphone greeting is in line with our recommended

greeting and does not contain background voices, noises and so on

  • Invite the caller to leave a message (after the tone) along with their

name and phone number;

  • Reassure the caller that you will respond to their message as soon as

possible

  • Provide another number (not attached to an answerphone) for

emergencies

  • Make sure that you check your answerphone regularly and deal

with all messages promptly

  • Change the greeting if you are going to leave the answerphone on for

longer than 48 hours.

Mobile phones

These standards apply as well as the ‘Mobile Telephone User Procedures’ which we will give you when we provide a mobile phone.If you are issued with a mobile phone

You will:

  • Follow the service standards for land-line phones if these apply, for

example, response time and greeting

  • Be considerate to those around you
  • Avoid using a mobile in a meeting unless absolutely necessary. (You

should divert your calls to voicemail or another telephone extension

  • where messages can be taken. If you are expecting an important call,

set your phone to silent or vibrate and apologise before and after the

call.)

Monitoring methods

Appoint ‘mystery shoppers’ to report back on the quality of the service.

Assess satisfaction levels using customer comments and surveys.

Section Three - Dealing with written correspondence (letters, faxes and e-mails)

Standard

Our written communications will be customer focussed, clear, understandable, written in plain English,timely and appropriate to the person receiving them.

All written correspondence should:

  • Have a professional and polite tone
  • Be clear with good use of everyday English (avoid jargon)
  • Answer the customer query
  • Provide a clear answer/advice
  • Inform the customer of the next steps (where appropriate)
  • Include information which is correct and straight to the point
  • Display clear understanding of processes and procedures
  • Have an average sentence length of 15-20 words
  • Use words like ‘we’ and ‘you’ rather than ‘Six Town Housing’ and ‘Resident’
  • Give 0161 686 8000/ 0808 144 5368as contact numbers to customers

Letters

We will:

  • Acknowledge all letters within five working days of receiving customer enquiry. This will include telling customers who will be dealing with the enquiry and how the customer can contact them.
  • Respond to emails within three working days
  • Send a detailed reply to the customer within ten working days of receiving the enquiry. If we are unable to do this, we will let the customer know and tell them when they can expect a full reply.
  • Ensure we answer the enquiry in full
  • Make clear to the reader what the next step is (where appropriate)
  • Date-stamp all forms of correspondence on the day we receive it
  • Follow our guidelines for layout and house styles
  • Follow plain English guidelines
  • Check letters before you send them
  • Review standard letters at least every two years

Faxes

You will:

  • Follow our house style
  • Mark clearly where the content is restricted and is only for the person

who is receiving the fax

  • Avoid sending sensitive or highly confidential information (see the

guidelines about confidentiality in section 5)

  • Say how many pages you are sending in total
  • Give a phone number so that the person receiving the fax can contact

you if any pages are missing.

Monitoring methods

Managers will set up systems to track incoming mail and response times.

Customers can give us feedback on the written communication they have received.

Managers will feed back to staff in a timely manor with a coaching and development focus.

E-mail

You will:

  • Check regularly to see if you have received any e-mail
  • Acknowledge all e-mails within five working days and send a full

response, with contact details, within 10 working days

  • Explain to the customer the reason for the delay if you cannot send a

full response within 10 working days

  • Keep messages short and simple using clear and helpful titles
  • Always consider the tone of a message
  • Make clear to the reader what the next step is (where appropriate)
  • Always read over an e-mail before sending, check spelling, grammar

and punctuation and use the spell checker if necessary

  • Use an auto-signature that provides enough contact information, (for

example, your name and job title, department or service area, full

  • e-mail address, telephone number and fax number)
  • Use the ‘Out of Office Assistant’ when out of the office - using the standard text which offers another e-mail addressor phone number for urgent matters
  • Send details of any complaint to the Customer Contact Team

so that it can be recorded and monitored

  • Only give out Six Town Housing email address and not your personal email address to customers

Monitoring methods (please see Quality Monitoring Process)

Evaluate outcomes and the effect upon our targets.

Assess satisfaction levels using customer comments.

Managers evaluation and feedback to staff

Section Four – Complaints Section

Our customers can now complain in a variety of ways. Over the telephone, face to face, in writing, completing a Making a Difference leaflet or by E mail.

We will always offer customers assistance in completing the Making A Difference form if required. Complaints will be acknowledged within 5 working days and a full written response will be received within 10 working days of the date on acknowledgement letter.Complimentary gifts will be sanctioned by the Customer Contact Manager where it is felt that we have delivered a poor service. These will be delivered by hand to customers where possible

When handling a complaint over the telephone or face to face we will:

  • Deal with the complaint in a professional manner
  • Actively listen to the customers complaint
  • Acknowledge the complaint
  • Display empathy
  • Build rapport with the customer
  • Adapt our body language, language, tone to the customer
  • Clearly communicate the solution and next steps to the customer
  • Provide the customer with accurate information
  • Accept ownership of the complaint
  • Record ethnicity data

When handling a complaint in writing we will:

  • Acknowledge the complaint
  • Maintain a professional and polite tone
  • Provide a clear answer/advice back to the customer
  • Ensure that the information you provide is clear and accurate
  • Pay attention to detail

Monitoring method

We will prepare a report for Executive Management Team by 2nd Monday in each month on the compliments, complaints, comments and suggestions which we have received and recorded. We will learn from our complaints and change and improve our working practices from the feedback we receive.

We will facilitate a Complaints Quality Action Group and include tenants on this group.

We will carry out In house telephone, face to face and written quality monitoring and attend quarterly meetings with Housing Governance, Strategy & Quality Team to discuss complaints performance and customer satisfaction survey results.

Who deals with complaints?

The managers in the customer contact centre will ensure:

  • Acknowledgement letter is sent
  • The complaints data base is updated
  • The complaint is referred to relevant team for a draft response
  • Response letter is authorised and sent out
  • Customer satisfaction regarding our dealing with complaints is measured
  • Performance indicators are compiled and reported

Section Five - Maintaining Confidentiality

Data Protection

Standard

We must handle any personal data within the legal framework of the Data Protection Act (DPA) 1998. Under this law, we are the datacontrollers’ of personal data. The DPA sets out eight data principles we must keep to. The first principle says that “personal data shall be processed fairly and lawfully and in particular shall not be processed unless specific criteria are met”. Data processing means gathering, recording, reading, sending, storing, altering, revealing, destroying or erasing information.

Every person who uses our services and all our employees can expect that we will not reveal any information held about them without their permission, unless there are exceptional circumstances. If we give anyone else information about our customers or staff, this will be in line with the Data Protection Act 1998 and our own Data Protection Policy.

We will:

  • Be aware of our data protection policy and procedures
  • Take personal and individual responsibility for confidentiality
  • Be aware of our register entries that show why data has been

collected and who can have access to it

  • Treat that information appropriately.

Main actions

Before you share personal information about someone else, you must make sure that:

  • Security checks have been carried out
  • Our register entry allows you to share this information
  • The person has been told what the data is going to be used for.
  • Under the DPA, we must meet one of the following conditions before processing data.
  • The person concerned (the data subject) has given their permission.

Or, the data:

  • Allows us to fulfil a contract relating to an individual
  • Allows us to meet our legal obligation
  • Protects the interests of the person concerned
  • Allows us to carry out some specific public function
  • Is needed so we can carry out our work, as long as this does not

affect the interests of the person concerned.