Agenda item

At the request of Members the Committee to discuss the proposed closure of Customer Services Surgeries that currently take place at Crediton and Cullompton on a twice monthly basis.

Cllr F W Letch had requested that the planned cessation of Customer First Surgeries that were held at Crediton and Cullompton, for four hours every other week, be discussed by the Committee.

Cllr Letch informed Members that he was a Town Councillor as well as a District Councillor and that wearing both hats could be difficult, however Crediton was at the centre of his heart and he considered that it was often forgotten.  He reminded Members that on 31 March 2016 the Crediton office had been closed.  The Town Council had employed one of the ex-officers within their own office using funding from the authority.  Cllr Letch said that he considered it essential that the District Council provided a service there.  He did not agree that residents should be expected to use the internet or telephone to make contact and queried the need for face to face contact at Phoenix House if that were the case. Cllr Letch had received two letters of objection from local residents and when he had been in attendance, on what he was told was a ‘quiet day’, eleven people had been seen in the surgery. Many local residents were elderly and could not use the internet or telephone, which could often be confusing.  Cllr Letch did not consider the Lords Meadow Leisure Centre to be an appropriate place for a public access computer as many people did not know where it was and it was not very easy to get to.

Cllr Letch read out a letter from a representative of the Crediton and District Access Group in which the author claimed that the most vulnerable would be affected, that there were logistical difficulties in getting to Tiverton for a face to face appointment and that the residents of Crediton would not be receiving an equal service.  Cllr Letch proposed downsizing the level of service in Tiverton to enable an increase of service in Cullompton and Crediton.

Discussion took place regarding:

·       Consultation that had taken place the previous year;

·       Local people might not be confident in the use of technology or the telephone;

·       Cuts in service to the Citizens Advice and Age Concern who had provided support in the past;

·       People that had difficulties using IT could get support from friends or family;

·       The need to move towards digital channels to save money and reduce the number of staff required to answer phones or deal with face to face enquiries;

·       Many residents in rural areas had no local access to an office and already had to travel or use digital methods of contact;

·       A campaign from the Crediton Courier had only resulted in one complaint;

·       Rural Broadband.

The Director of Corporate Affairs & Business Transformation provided the following information which was tabled:

Crediton and Cullompton fortnightly Surgeries

Reason for the decision

• As part of a decision to rationalise council services, the Council withdrew from buildings in Cullompton and Crediton on 1^st April 2016.

• When the full time service ended last year the staff resource was removed from the Customer First (CF) budget.

• Since then, officers had provided a fortnightly ‘surgery’ in those locations to ease the transition and to continue to make use of the available IT connections until those ceased.

• With the IT connection stopping in August, the decision was made to cease the surgeries as these could not be justified when officers were simply signposting people to the internet or providing telephone numbers to access services rather than being able to ‘do any business’ on-site.

• As this was the final element of implementing the 2016 decision, not a further change, additional consultation was not carried out, but advance notification of the changes occurred in order to provide notice rather than simply stopping.

• Last year the CF target for answering calls was reduced to 85%, to reflect the reduction in resource.  Although the call centre staff were able to exceed this target for external calls, overall only 82% of all calls were answered. In total over 25,000 calls were not answered.

• In addition, Customer First staff were responsible for responding to emails, logging media enquiries, responding to social media and web contacts. Online form submissions (digital transactions) had increased from 16,600 in 15/16 to 31,700 in 16/17.

• Customers who are unsure of how to access services could telephone for advice and Customer First staff work with all service managers to ensure that services could be accessed by those with greater needs such as the elderly or more vulnerable residents. It was still vital that we could support those people that really need more support.

Planning for future services

• Increasingly, the Council were asked to provide more online services and to accept documents and applications online. We needed to be able to support customers as more government services (and other associated functions) go online.

• As a significant example, next year Universal Credit (UC) would be implemented in Devon. This was only accessed on line, and MDDC staff would no longer be able to support customers with enquiries relating to UC. Hence our role would be to signpost people and help people go online. This was very much the direction of travel.

It was RECOMMENDED that Council be asked to look at the idea of diminishing the level of face to face services at Phoenix House to allow for one session a month to be provided at Crediton and Cullompton.

(Proposed by Cllr F W Letch and seconded by Cllr T W Snow)