Council officers handled over 250,000 inbound customer phone calls, 150,000 emails and 50,000 tweets at the height of the pandemic, as part of the city’s round the clock response to supporting residents in need.
The Contact Centre team has been thanked for their lockdown efforts – which have largely been from home – ahead of the Council’s move to re-instate all phone lines to pre-Covid levels.
From tomorrow (Monday 5 October) a full service will start to resume with 200 staff managing customer queries by social media, email and phone. This will take place remotely and from Council buildings, seven days a week, 24 hours a day.
Residents are being urged to keep going online where possible to save time and to keep phone lines free for those without digital access.
Councillor Rob Munn, interim Convener of the Finance and Resources Committee, said: “Our customer team has done an incredible job of supporting residents, with great care given to help some of our most vulnerable citizens during what has been a very challenging situation. I’d like to thank each one of them for this as they prepare to return to their usual roles.
“Over the last six months, we have seen more and more residents save time by going online to report an issue, request help or pay for services, and that’s something we want to see continue.
“We know increasing numbers of people would rather use their mobile phone, tablet or computer to contact us and the website is by far and away the quickest and simplest way to get in touch. The savings we make from digital service delivery can also be invested towards improving the city.
“That said, not everyone has the means, the ability or the want to go online. That’s why it’s also important that we start to reinstate our usual phone services again, and why we need people to help us keep these lines free and accessible for those who need them most.”
Councillor Joan Griffiths, Vice Convener of the Finance and Resources Committee, added: “The ways in which we communicate in our day-to-day lives have evolved this year and our Contact Centre team has had to adapt to the changing demands of the Council, of residents and of course the pandemic.
“More than ever, residents and businesses want and need to contact us and receive information digitally, and our officers offer a responsive social media and email service.
“We recognise that the team has helped an unprecedented number of residents with questions and concerns at all hours of the day, and that they have done this from home. It has been an incredible effort and I’m pleased that we’re now seeing a return to more phone lines being open too.
“We recently extended our ICT contract with CGI which will help us to move more services online and invest in new technology, as this is all part of our commitment to making Edinburgh a Smart City. I’m sure we’ll continue to see a sea change in the way people want to interact with our services and the demand for quick, useful online services will only increase.”
An emergency only service was introduced during lockdown so that the most critical customer queries could be prioritised as well as new phone lines to support people who were vulnerable and shielding.
Many officers were also redirected to boost welfare and benefits advice services and to process tens of thousands of applications for the Coronavirus business support scheme, which has allowed over £112m to be paid out in grants to local business owners.
The Council’s website is designed for reporting issues such as problems with street lighting, potholes and litter and there are currently 70 services available, ranging from requesting a new recycling bin to parking and licensing transactions. It is also simpler and quicker than ever to report, request or pay online, with customers no longer needing to register or sign in to their mygovscot account to use online waste services.
Since the drive to move customer contact online was launched in 2015, the number of transactions being processed by the Council online has risen to over 80,000 a month with the website receiving close to 288,000 visits every week.
