Salary and grade: £24 760 – Grade 3 progression possible to Grade 4
Duration of role: Permanent
Hours per week: 37 hours per week
Location: Hybrid working – working at home and at Abbey House, Abingdon on a rota basis.
Closing date: 9th June 2023
About the role and what we’re looking for
This is an exciting opportunity to join the Customer Service Team within South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse District Councils as we develop our new customer service centre to become a single point of customer contact for the councils. We are at the start of a project to review all our customer transactions to make sure they really work for our customers by providing a quick, efficient and consistent response. We’re also introducing our new CRM system, so these are exciting times for the team.
We’re looking for an outstanding customer service professional to work as part of the team of Customer Service Advisors to deliver a first class, professional and understanding service and to assist customers with a broad range of enquiries both face to face and by telephone/email. You’ll need to be a real ‘people person’ with a ‘can do’ attitude, as the team will triage all customer contact; you’ll be willing to take ownership of customer enquiries which can be dealt with ‘once and done’ and track down the answers. Or for more complex cases you’ll pass them on to the relevant service team to resolve.
You’ll be responsible for dealing with high volumes and sometimes complex customer enquiries on a range of issues related to our planning department, garden waste, revenues / benefits, and other services.
You will also be the first point of contact for customers in our reception at Abbey House, this will be on a rota basis, on other days you will be working from home taking telephone calls or responding to emails as part of our hybrid way of working.
This role will suit you if you are resilient, enjoy variety and like to work in a fast-paced team environment. You’ll need to be able to absorb a lot of information, relay that information to customers and have a high level of attention to detail.
You’ll also need to be flexible and eager to learn as over time we’ll be looking for you to increase your knowledge and skills and take on enquiries about an increasingly broad range of services the councils provide.
Main duties and responsibilities
Provide efficient and effective customer service to all customers face to face at reception- Take ownership of and resolve customer enquiries covering a broad range of council services.
- Develop and maintain a broad knowledge of the councils’ services, its staff structure, and functions
- Supporting customers to access wider council services, or signposting them to other organisations
- Take payments from customers who are unable to use our online payments system.
- Promote self-service by supporting customers with the use of telephones, self-serve terminals and web access points located within reception area.
- Meet individual performance targets and positively contribute to team targets.
- Ensure compliance with all council policies and procedures when answering customer enquiries and to ensure that records are maintained accurately.
- Encourage feedback from customers, share your own ideas and positively embrace continuous improvement initiatives to enhance the customer journey.
- Support the CSAs, team leaders and service manager in implementation of new ways of working
- Take formal complaints for all services from customers who wish to do so by telephone
Your essential skills, knowledge and experience
A minimum of one year customer service experience- Previous telephone experience in a customer service environment taking inbound calls
- Good IT skills including use of internet, e-mail, data bases, Word, Excel as well as good keyboard skills
- Strong communication skills, both written and oral
- Experience of taking ownership of issues and providing solutions for customers
- Excellent attention to detail
- Ability to work in a methodical way ensuring accuracy of data and excellent attention to detail
- Able to work under pressure and prioritise effectively
- Highly customer focused, understands and has delivered high standards of customer service
- Well developed, advanced communication skills
- Aptitude to be analytical with their thought processes
- Manages their own time well, recognising the need to prioritise
- In-depth working knowledge of all council processes and procedures
- Excellent telephone manner and communication skills, both verbal and written
- Efficient at gathering relevant information
- Always reliable and consistently performs at a high level
- Maths, English GCSE’s (grade C and above) or an equivalent level of qualification
- Previous face to face experience in a customer service environment.
- Experience of working within a local authority.
- Experience of working with CRM solutions.
- A specific customer service qualification.
Your style and behaviours
A great team player – reliable and flexible with a desire to achieve results by working with others- Strong customer ethos and desire to own customer enquiries and exceed expectations
- Approachable and willing to assist others, and have a real empathy with customers
- Ability to communicate effectively
- A positive and proactive approach to work with a “can do” attitude – support for other teams
- Willing to take responsibility for own development and with support continually improve
- Ability to embrace and drive change as part of the team
- Achieve and maintain positive behaviours in line with our Vision and Values
- A respected team member recognised for being a team player
- Comfortable as a role model who leads by example and supports their team members
- Works in a professional manner understanding the need for confidentiality and integrity
- A Multitasker who is resilient and works well under pressure
- Flexible and adaptable, able to step up to support urgent business needs as required
- Willingness to take part in team and corporate initiatives