Town hall to spend £6.6m on its 'customers’

By Deborah Linton

February 09, 2010

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Manchester council has drawn up the ambitious three year strategy after a survey of 9,000 taxpayers revealed they were frustrated and dissatisfied with current levels of service.

TOWN hall bosses are to spend more than £6m on improving customer services.

Manchester council has drawn up the ambitious three year strategy after a survey of 9,000 taxpayers revealed they were frustrated and dissatisfied with current levels of service.

The council will spend £6.6m in a bid to rectify the problem, according to a report set to be approved by its executive this week .

A huge slice of the budget will go on installing a new computer system to streamline the service residents receive.

The Microsoft 'Customer Relationship Management' system, designed to give an overview of every customer and any ongoing concerns to staff, will be implemented by top consultancy firm, Deloitte, and is set to cost over £3.7m over the next three years.

Cash will also go on revamping the council website, delivering staff customer services training, creating a staff intranet, developing a corporate contact centre in Belle Vue, potentially making all services accessible to residents through a single telephone number, and creating a new town hall service centre.

The one-stop counter will open at the council's temporary First Street site in June, moving to the town hall extension when the four-year makeover of the Albert Square complex is complete.

Interact

A report from the council's Directorate of Transformation states: 'The work will radically improve the way we interact with customers.'

Around one-third of the project will be funded by town hall revenue and the remainder from the capital budget. It is designed to offer more consistent quality, involvement and satisfaction to residents who had complained that they were not kept informed about complaints, found it difficult to get through on the telephone and had to chase queries themselves, according to the papers.

Coun Bernard Priestsaid: "Manchester City Council is committed to continuously improving services for residents and other customers while reducing costs for council taxpayers.

“We are investing in a number of significant changes which will make services simpler and faster to use and easier to understand. This is a key part of the council's budget strategy to improve services while saving money through improved efficiency.

"While this investment equates to less than £5 per resident per year over three years, much more money than that will be saved as a result.

“This approach will be pioneered at One First Street from this summer while refurbishment of the town hall extension takes place and the Customer Service Centre will move to the town hall extension in 2013 once refurbishment is complete.

Simplifying

"We are also simplifying things by creating a new contact centre and working towards a single telephone number which residents can use to call the council - enabling trained staff to deal with most inquiries on the spot or, where this is not possible, rapidly refer them to someone who can.

"An improved computer system will give council staff a 'single view' of residents' dealings with the council, allowing us to understand if they have any outstanding requests or other services we can help them with.

"In addition enhancements to the council's website will make it quicker to use - ensuring residents can access information they need in the minimum number of mouse clicks - and use more services online."

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Mark,Radcliffe. (09/02/2010 at 14:47)

Opening a 'Book of Resignations' would be a start.

Audenshaw Bob (09/02/2010 at 14:56)

The public want councils to focus on their core responsibilities and serve the public.

Basic thinsg like emptying the bins, gritting the roads, repairing pavements and ensuring our sfatety.

NOT, using anti-terror laws to spy on those who put their bins out an hour early, using cctv cars to catch people eating an apple whilst staionary at traffic lights, spying on our emails, wasting money on the dodgy congestion charge bid. Stop nosying and telling us how we should run our lives and do what a council is supposed to.

Also when you owe me £550 council tax, pay it as quickly as you would expect me to pay you if I was late paying - not six months after agreeing you owed me. That type of thing really.

Andanotherthing, Mcr (09/02/2010 at 15:13)

Cllr Priest, before spending more tax payers money, will you ask the other councils for mis allocated £420.000.00 please

jordy, Middleton (09/02/2010 at 15:22)

All these internal revamps at tax payers costs seem so cosmetic. As if it appears the council are doing something positive, which really they aren't.

Jay B, oldham (09/02/2010 at 15:23)

i know who'd be at the top of my list in that book mark!!

Moorlok, London (09/02/2010 at 15:29)

I hear yet another excuse for the council to lavish taxpayers money on mountains of bureaucracy, fact finding missions for council employees, lavish seminars and other pointless jollies rather than the services we demand, and the services we pay them for!

The only party I want to see is a mass-resignation party from these perennial leechers!

Mark,Radcliffe. (09/02/2010 at 15:49)

Andanotherthing..astute accounting by yourself.The actual amount should be around £6.2m,as the taxpayer has already contributed £450,000.The Council knows where it is,so "Go Fetch".

James S (09/02/2010 at 16:39)

how on earth can a relatively simple software package cost £3.7million?!!

Ace Riley, outsidethebox (09/02/2010 at 17:31)

Is the new "Clown hall " getting a new ringmaster?.

Count Arthur Strong, Hulme (09/02/2010 at 17:44)

They ought to start by doing a bit of work for a change. By doing that we the tax payers will save £6.5m a they will be doing what they are already being paid for. It's well known that local government workers are amongst the most bone idle people in the country and only slightly behind militant strikers.

Rammylad (09/02/2010 at 18:06)

I know a lad who can get most software with the license cracked so if MCC want to save some meney I'll happily put the two parties together.

£6.6m on software, do they think were daft, oh, yes they do.

Just had a call from the labour party asking how I will vote, I think after 10 minutes of bashing Mr Leese and his dodgy con charge fiasco she was sorry she called.

Mark,Radcliffe. (09/02/2010 at 18:41)

Rammy Lad...this phone-call,are you sure it wasnt 'Our Vera' ?

PW, Manchester (09/02/2010 at 19:00)

They could take some of that money to start fixing the hole in the road near Far Lane in Gorton that's been causing massive traffic hold-ups over the last two days

Guten Tag, Manchester (09/02/2010 at 20:41)

They had a multi-million pound IT system installed in 2004 to aid every council worker and that was supposed to make all software systems super efficient and fast thus saving council tax money and making on-line services better and faster for both workers and customers. Mo money, mo money! Someone is raking it in!

Bemused of Tameside., Dukinfield (10/02/2010 at 00:00)

Sorry but since when do councils have 'customers' ???

I am an acountant, my Dad says I have victims! :)

HM Revenue & Customs now apparently has customers!!!

As I see it customers seek custom at their choice ..... does anyone do that with the council or the tax office??????

It's all totally mad.

Sir Hugo Wright-Wrong, Manchester (10/02/2010 at 08:04)

" PW, Manchester
They could take some of that money to start fixing the hole in the road near Far Lane in Gorton that's been causing massive traffic hold-ups over the last two days"

Perhaps if you had an ounce of civic pride and 30 seconds of spare time which obviously you don't , you could have reported the problem yourself and had it sorted, so with your lack of lustre and determination maybe your true vocation should have been with Manchester City Council with the other lifeless statues.

J smith (10/02/2010 at 08:09)

this is the council that has lost £430000 and has written it off, where have you lost my money, what did it look like, have you checked behind the fridge?

Moorlok, London (10/02/2010 at 08:27)

"They could take some of that money to start fixing the hole in the road near Far Lane in Gorton that's been causing massive traffic hold-ups over the last two days
PW, Manchester"

It takes Manchester City Council several months of health, safety, planning, public consultation, union, fact-finding missions to the Algarve, power lunching, and committee meetings to decide to fill in a hole in the road. Don't hold your breath!

Ace Riley, outsidethebox (11/02/2010 at 12:21)

The council rely on computers to much they should go back to the old way of dealing with people one on one. teach the existing staff manners and (some english) it costs nothing for manners and those prescious words "Please and thank you" unfortunately i mostly receive these manners from mainly the african/asian staff at the townhall etc.I think the british have lost the art of manners.

Hurry O'Caine - the Irish Whirlind, Typhoon Tipperary (11/02/2010 at 12:38)

You might have thought that a part as 'people-focused' as the so called Labour party might have already found out how to satisfy the citizenry that provides the cash for their stupid hare-brained schemes (i.e. B of the Bang, Con Charge ...) considering how long we have been under their yoke (sp. joke).

PW, Manchester (11/02/2010 at 12:39)

Sir Hugo, And silly me thought they would know about the road collapsing, seeing as they had put cones and barriers around it the same day it happened. I'd have felt a little foolish reporting something they and several tens of thousands of people already knew about.

They have now set to work on it, and traffic is crawling nose to tail averaging 6 miles per hour.

Clucking Feather (11/02/2010 at 20:52)

James S: easily - the business systems that the IT has to deal with are so convoluted that lots of consultants are involved, and there's usually lots of money trying (and failing) to get it talking to other IT systems. The only reason they need an IT system such as this CRM jobbie is so they can measure some key performance indicators (which they will ensure they achieve even if it means making the way they work less efficient) rahter than working out what the public wants and delivering it properly. Local government is run on targets - if that's what you are measured on, that's what you do. IT can help a well designed process, but it shouldn't be the end itself.

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