Waverley Borough Council Committee System - Committee Document
Meeting of the Council held on 11/12/2007
Draft Customer Charter
ANNEXE 1
DRAFT
Customer Charter
This leaflet gives you some information about the quality of service you can expect to receive from the Council. We can also provide this information in large print, on tape or in a number of different languages. For further details please telephone 01483 523…(tbc)
Dealing with our customers
We will:
·
Focus on your needs in all the services we provide.
·
Be friendly, approachable and professional.
·
Listen carefully and respect your confidentiality, keeping to relevant data protection laws.
·
Apologise if we get things wrong and take steps to avoid similar mistakes in the future.
Providing our services
We will:
·
Make every effort to provide you with high quality services which offer value for money.
·
Continue to look at ways of improving our services.
·
Consult you on a regular basis and take into account your suggestions and views.
·
Provide you with a range of options for making payments to the Council, including some which are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
·
Make sure that all information on our services is clearly presented on our website and in our publications, and is kept up to date.
Ensuring openness and accountability
We will:
·
Make sure that contact details for all Councillors are kept up to date and available to you on our web site and in our publications.
·
Make sure that you can find all committee reports (that do not apply to exempt matters) on our website a week before the meeting.
·
Publicise widely the opportunity for you to have your say at or before meetings of the Council.
·
Continue to webcast meetings of the Council and the Executive and any other meetings which we think will be of interest to you.
·
Continue to let you have as much information as possible in ‘open’ committee reports.
Ensuring equal access
We will:
·
Treat you fairly, irrespective of your age, gender, religion, race, cultural beliefs, sexual orientation, disability or any other reason.
·
Use plain English, avoid jargon and provide you with an interpreter if necessary.
·
Look at ways of making sure that all our premises and our services are accessible to everybody.
Communicating with our customers
(a) Letters and e mails
We will aim to:
·
Acknowledge all your emails and letters within 3 working days.
·
Send a detailed response to all your letters and emails within 10 working days. If we cannot send you a full response for whatever reason, we will keep you informed.
(b) Telephone calls
We will aim to:
·
Answer all your telephone calls within 3 rings.
·
Greet you and identify ourselves by name and/or department.
·
Make alternative arrangements for those occasions when we cannot answer your telephone call in person.
(c) In person
We will:
·
Make sure that you can find details of our opening hours on our website, in all publications about our services and on notices displayed clearly in all our offices.
·
Greet you on arrival and make sure that our waiting areas are comfortable and tidy.
·
Aim to be punctual for meetings and appointments with you, and give you sufficient notice of any cancellation or change in arrangements.
·
Provide you with private interview facilities where this is necessary.
·
Visit you at home if you cannot leave your home, and will always provide you with proof of who we are before entering your property.
Dealing with complaints
We will:
·
Make sure that information on our formal complaints procedure is available to all.
·
Try to settle all your complaints quickly and informally.
·
Try to respond to all your complaints within 10 working days or within 15 working days when your complaint concerns a planning matter. When this is not possible we will provide you with a progress report within these timescales.
·
Carry out an annual review of complaints received and lessons learned
·
Carry out regular customer satisfaction monitoring of our complaints handling.
Dealing with Information Rights Requests
We will:
·
Make sure that all your written requests for information under the Freedom of Information Act are answered within 20 working days, or provide you with a progress report if more time is required to consider whether we can provide the information requested within the terms of the Act.
·
Make sure that all your Subject Access Requests under the Data Protection Act are answered within 40 calendar days.
·
Carry out an annual review of all information requests received by the Council.
How are we doing?
It would be much appreciated if you could:
·
Give us feedback on what you think about the services we provide, so that we can use your views when looking at service improvements.
·
Let us know if you believe that a service or member of staff has been particularly helpful. (It is always good to receive compliments and useful for team managers to know that their staff are performing well).
Contacting us
You can contact us in the following ways:
Visit our website
You can find an A-Z of service departments and direct telephone numbers on our website at
www.waverley.gov.uk
E mail us
You can email us at
enquiries@waverley.gov.uk
or
complaints@waverley.gov.uk
Write to us
You can write to us at The Council Offices, The Burys, Godalming, Surrey, GU7 1HR
Telephone us
You can telephone us on the following numbers
Main Council Offices 01483 523333
Cranleigh Locality Office 01483 277399
Farnham Locality Office 01252 725083
Haslemere Locality Office 01428 648818
Visit our offices
You can visit our Main Council offices which are located at The Burys, Godalming Surrey GU7 1HR
The opening hours are:
Office hours: Mon – Thurs 8.45am – 5.15pm
Friday 8.45am – 4.45pm
Saturday 9.00am – 12 noon
Cash office hours: Mon – Thursday 9.00am – 4.45pm
Friday 9.00am – 4.15pm
Saturday 9.00am – 12 noon
Comms/exec/2007-08/127
