The UK Department of Communities and Local Government is working hard to improve local governments' communication with citizens. The white paper 'Communities in control: real people, real power' promised to commission a review to look at the feasibility and practicality of introducing and extending the idea of redress for citizens when their council services fail to meet agreed standards. This review was conducted and looked into the question of how a customer-focused approach can be embedded in the culture of local service providers. The main output of the Review was a Practitioners’ Toolkit developed by local authority practitioners. It is intended to be a practical aid to help councils work with customers and other partners to identify key issues for improvement in their service provision.
To ensure local service providers not only deal better with complaints but also get it ‘right first time’, the main themes of the Review were:
- The service and remedy pledge: clearly setting out how local service providers will get it right, and right any wrongs;
- The importance of the frontline: understanding that good people are more important than process, and
- Customer-focused partnerships: making sure that partnerships deliver a seamless experience and an economy of effort for the customer.