Birmingham contact centre wins customer service award

A Birmingham customer contact centre that deals with over two million calls a year has been awarded a top industry award – for the second year running.

Service Birmingham’s contact centre handles customer calls to Birmingham City Council and has been awarded the Customer Service Excellence (CSE) Standard by the Government.

Service Birmingham took over responsibility for handling the council’s contact centre operations in February 2010 from previous contractor, Vertex.

The CSE Standard is an elite accreditation covering five key criteria and awarded to organisations that:

• Demonstrate an in-depth understanding of customers
• Build a customer-focused culture
• Provide information to customers that is accurate and detailed
• Deal effectively with problems that arise
• Show standards and targets for dealing with customers are measurable.

As part of an in-depth 65-page report, the Customer Service Excellence assessment stated:  “Managers and staff across the contact centres are completely focused on delivery of an efficient service that is monitored closely, and where staff are rewarded  appropriately and encouraged to become increasingly involved in identifying improvements that enhance accuracy, timeliness, accessibility and choice.” The report continues: “This service has demonstrated its continuing commitment to the principles of Customer Service Excellence to remain accredited to the Standard.”

Welcoming the CSE Standard re-accreditation, Service Birmingham’s chief executive, Stewart Wren said: “Achieving the Customer Service Excellence standard two years in a row is a real tribute to the hard work of all the team in the contact centre, from managers to customer advisors. The standard shows that Service Birmingham’s contact centre operation is strong. However, as the first link in the chain, we must continue to work with City Council directorates in improving the end-to-end service provided to Birmingham residents.”

“Many vulnerable people rely on us as the first point of call for key public services so we have a duty to help make the whole system as efficient and easy to use as possible.”