City of Greater Sudbury Customer Service Strategy 2019-2022 Purpose

Customer Service Strategy 2019-2022

City of Greater Sudbury Customer Service Strategy 2019-2022

Purpose
The purpose of this report is to seek Council’s approval of the City of Greater Sudbury’s first
enterprise-wide Customer Service Strategy.

Background
In January 2018, staff presented a report to Council entitled “Evolving Service Strategy and 311”. This
report, and the subsequent presentation made to Finance and Administration Committee on February 6,
provided an overview of the strategy staff are developing to establish clear expectations about the
service experience people have when doing business with the City.
As part of that report, staff identified that focusing on transaction-oriented business processes,
including a particular focus on 311 services, will allow staff to produce a series of plans to evolve the
organization’s policy, process design, technology utilization and staff training, all of which will assist us
to ensure that service promises are consistently delivered.
In April 2018, staff presented a report to Council entitled “Customer Service Issues and Principles”.
This report presented an analysis of the issues that a corporate customer service strategy needed to
address. It also identified specific principles that should be reflected in any changes to policy or
processes that would be considered as part of ongoing work to enhance the organization’s customer
service culture.
In September 2018, staff presented a report to Council entitled “Customer Service Strategy and CRM
Replacement Update”. This report provided an overview of the research and analysis conducted to
support the development of the strategy being presented to Council in this report.

Customer Service Strategy
The Customer Service Strategy is the result of extensive research. Based on the customer service
principles previously presented to Council, the strategy lays the groundwork for three years of work in
strengthening a customer service culture, from 2019 to 2022. The strategy is intended as a roadmap for
describing to employees what we will do to make a positive customer service culture part of the City of
Greater Sudbury brand, and as a method for citizens to assess the corporation’s progress.

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Customer Service Strategy 2019-2022

Customer Service Principles
The customer service principles on which the customer service strategy is built are expected to address
the issues identified as requiring particular attention at the City of Greater Sudbury. There are seven
principles, as follows:
    1. We have agreed upon standards for customer service.
    2. We recruit, train and empower employees to provide great customer service and recognize
       those who go the extra mile.
    3. We resolve issues on a first contact basis where possible.
    4. Our staff are knowledgeable and consistently have the information they need to provide the
       right answer.
    5. We are committed to measuring and improving our customer service performance.
    6. We use technology to effectively leverage customer service opportunities and address customer
       service issues.
    7. A positive customer service culture is part of the City of Greater Sudbury brand.

Customer Service Vision
The customer service vision describes, in a simple, straightforward way, the outcomes this strategy is
expected to produce. It will provide a method for assessing progress and our effectiveness at designing
and delivering staff training, new technology and new processes or process changes to support our
customer service principles. The corporation’s customer service vision is:
“We foster and build a service-focused culture with empowered employees who know what to do, how to
 do it, and who go the extra mile to provide a positive customer experience. When citizens engage with
                 the City, they receive consistent, timely, and solution-oriented service.
                                      Respect. Excellence. Connection. Service.”
The strategy infuses this vision into every aspect of the work that will be done to put the strategy into
action including:
      recruiting, training, empowering and recognizing employees,
      building knowledge and service expectations,

      measuring progress; and,
      a “consistent, timely, and solution-oriented” service experience.
The four words that finish the vision are values that are all-inclusive; that is, they apply to employees
and citizens alike. The values are also in and of themselves bilingual, which speaks to the importance of
French language services in the provision of customer service.
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Customer Service Strategy 2019-2022

Focus Areas
The customer service strategy includes three main focus areas for the next three years:
    1. Building a service culture – focused on building and enhancing the organization’s capacity to
       provide great customer service.
    2. Enhancing service effectiveness – focused on measuring progress against defined standards and
       enhancing the capacity to resolve issues at the first point of contact.
    3. Service simply accessed – focused on service channels and building understanding of services
       across and outside the organization.
Action items defined as part of the strategy those that are reasonably expected to move the mark
against their respective focus area. On a broader level, however, the customer service culture that this
strategy invokes is a culture of “getting to yes”. This requires careful and appropriate change
management for both employees and citizens, particularly among those municipal services that
incorporate regulatory requirements that are not within the City’s direct control or enforcement
functions that emphasize the maintenance of community standards. Nevertheless, in all cases the goal
will be to align service delivery with the customer service vision.

Implementation
Implementation of the strategy will begin in 2019, and regular updates will be provided to Council and
to citizens as work progresses. Our primary focus in 2019 will be on training, education (internal and
external), 311 call centre performance, benchmarking and standard-setting, public reporting, as well as
the replacement of the City’s Customer Relationship Management system.

Implementation will begin formally upon Council approval of the customer service strategy; however, it
should be noted a number of administrative initiatives within staff’s direct control have already been
established, particularly in the 311 area, to enhance customer service, including:
        311 operators now greet citizens with their first name
        311 calls are now randomly screened and reviewed with operators for quality
         assurance/training purposes
        Regular reviews are being conducted with each 311 staff member to provide ongoing coaching
         in alignment with criteria associated with best practice in customer service and call centre
         operations
        Additional business units are continuously being on-boarded to the customer relationship
         management system

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Customer Service Strategy 2019-2022

        Additional knowledge/information on business unit services is continually being added to the
         311 knowledgebase, which enables 311 operators to handle more calls at the first point of
         contact
        A regular analysis of call volumes by time of day is being used to optimize the scheduling of staff
         to handle spikes in calls
        All 311 operators have been trained on dispatching urgent issues for immediate attention by
         area staff (eg. flooding, debris on road, traffic light outages, broken stop signs)
        A 311 training/best practice manual is under development
        An existing position has been re-focused on analyzing processes throughout the lifecycle of 311
         service requests - from the moment they are received in 311 to the moment they are completed
         by the staff responsible
        Ongoing work with staff in other business areas to ensure that cases are kept updated in the
         CRM system, and so that citizens can be provided with updates on their service requests when
         they call 311.

Conclusion
The City of Greater Sudbury operates approximately 60 lines of business, and while they are all diverse,
they nearly all directly influence customer service in some way. The City’s first enterprise-wide customer
service strategy will allow the City to build a foundation for customer service excellence. Customer
service reflects a shared responsibility between each employee and customers. There is mutual interest
in ensuring expectations are understood and the corporation’s capacity to serve aligns with Council’s,
and the community’s, standards.

Resources Cited
“Evolving Service Strategy and 311”. Report at Council meeting of January 23, 2018.
http://agendasonline.greatersudbury.ca/index.cfm?pg=feed&action=file&agenda=report&itemid=5&id=
1234
“Customer Service Issues and Principles”. Report at Finance and Administration meeting of April 17,
2018.
http://agendasonline.greatersudbury.ca/index.cfm?pg=agenda&action=navigator&id=1271&itemid=144
66
“Customer Service Strategy and CRM Replacement Update”. Report on Council meeting of September
11, 2018.
http://agendasonline.greatersudbury.ca/index.cfm?pg=feed&action=file&attachment=24577.pdf
Internal Customer Service Interview Results.
2016 City of Greater Sudbury Employee Engagement Survey Results. CityLinks.
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2018 City of Greater Sudbury Customer Service Survey. www.overtoyou.greatersudbury.ca.
7th Citizens First Study.Institute for Citizen-Centred Service.
8th Citizens First Study. Institute for Citizen-Centred Service.

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Appendix A: Research and Data

Purpose
The purpose of this appendix is to provide an overview of the research conducted and the findings
informing the identification of issues related to customer service for the City of Greater Sudbury. These
findings are from a number of sources, including:
        Approximately 70 interviews with managers from all sections of CGS (June/July 2018)

        Employee survey results (2016 and 2018)
        Data from 311 and call centre statistics
        The latest Citizens First reports, which identify customer service best practices (2014 and 2018)
        Contact with other municipalities and review of municipal customer service strategies
        A Customer Service Survey that was available online and at CGS service counters (summer 2018)
        Citizen Survey (2016 and 2018)

Employee Views of Our Customer Service Capacity
In the 2018 Employee Feedback Survey, “Customer Focus” placed 7th out of 13 survey measures, with
57% of employees rating it as favourable. This is 7% lower than the benchmark established by the City of
Greater Sudbury’s survey provider, TalentMap. Similarly, in the 2016 Employee Feedback Survey,
“Organizational Citizen Service Culture” placed 9th out of 30 survey measures, with 48.5% of employees
rating it as favourable. That score was also lower than the benchmark of the survey provider,
Metrics@Work, with a different score of 13%. The driver was proportionally more important to frontline
employees, who generally see a need for change in the corporation’s customer service approach.
As data from the Institute for Citizen-Centred Services (ICCS) shows, the relatively low overall placement
of “customer service culture” in the employee survey in the list of important issues is an indicator of a
need for change. High-performing organizations place a high value on, and understand how to influence,
customer service culture.
Based on feedback from employees, when an internal community engagement task force was
established in 2015, it was quickly expanded to include customer service as these were seen to be
intrinsically linked. Work conducted in that group identified a number of themes associated with what
was perceived as an organizational gap related to customer service and community engagement. These
themes were: the ability to respond quickly and consistently to issues, the availability of processes to
support consistent responsiveness, the availability of appropriate training for staff on facilitation,

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conflict resolution, customer service, and engagement, and the need for ongoing education to citizens
about what they can expect from the City.
One-on-one interviews were conducted with representatives from nearly each organizational area of
the City of Greater Sudbury to gather data on current customer service practices. The interviews
demonstrated that key elements associated with improved customer service included: enhanced
information sharing, as well as an enhanced community understanding on service expectations.
Additionally, many sections indicated that misdirected requests, not knowing who to contact or not
understanding what other areas do is a current barrier to good customer service. All of tese areas of
concern are being addressed through goals and actions items of the Customer Service Strategy, such as
customer service training and the implementation of an internal knowledgebase.

Citizen Views of Our Customer Service Capacity
In 2016, the City conducted a citizen perception survey, which surveyed 1,200 random households for
levels of satisfaction with local quality of life and opinions on municipal services.

     Half of residents that were surveyed (50%) said they had need of some kind of customer service
         contact with the City over the previous year.

     A large majority of the customer service contact over the previous year was via telephone – in
         fact, more than three-quarters of residents who contacted the City had contact by telephone
         (77%).

     Most residents were satisfied with the customer service they received.
     78% of residents were either ‘very’ satisfied (47%) or ‘somewhat’ satisfied (31%).
This perception to some extent points to a need to delve more deeply into the citizen experience of the
City’s customer service capacity. As an example of how other data may mitigate the findings of the
Citizen Survey, the ICCS report establishes that one of the key drivers of customer satisfaction is
timeliness of response: regular feedback received to the City of Greater Sudbury indicates that there is
an opportunity to enhance our consistency in the delivery of accurate information.
As part of the development of the Customer Service Strategy, a public survey was conducted in the
summer of 2018 to gather recent data and open-ended responses specific to customer service. While
there was a low response rate to this survey, the results were similar to the Citizen Survey. Seventy
percent of respondents indicated that they were satisfied or very satisfied – and a lack of timely
response from staff was the most common concern from citizens.
The qualitative feedback received about the City’s performance at a general level through different
mechanisms (eg, through social media, media stories, calls to staff, letters to the editor, public
engagement sessions, anecdotal evidence) reflects a neutral to negative perception of the City’s
capacity to deliver service. This can reasonably be considered to extend to our capacity to deliver
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customer service. Employees and residents alike feel that there are opportunities to enhance the culture
and knowledge around customer service.

311 Data and Call Centre Statistics
The City’s 311 service is one of the first points of contact with residents across the community, providing
first-contact customer service on over 20,000 calls and 400 @311 emails each month. The 311 Call
Centre is staffed by 7 full-time Call Centre Representatives, supplemented by 3 part-time positions, as
well as a Manager of 311 and Customer Service, a 311 Quality Assurance and Training Coordinator and a
311 Process Improvement Officer. Calls are answered by 311 staff between 8 am and 4:30 pm, with non-
911 emergency after-hours service (eg, flooding, sinkholes, traffic light outages) provided by a third
party contractor.
There is a significant volume of data that is available about the 311 system, including:
     Calls – volume, topic, department, number of calls after hours
     Type of call – transfer, service request, information
     Customer experience – on-hold time, call abandonment rate, first call resolution rate
     CRM service requests – resolution on time, case escalation rate, late resolution

     Call centre performance – agent active time, agent talk time.
An average of data pulled from 311 over the last year shows that the rate of CRM cases closed on time
varies significantly from one department to the next. This is reflective of the fact that different
departments have different standards for “closing” a case, as well as different definitions of what
“closing” a case means.
Some data for the past 12 months from 311 is as follows:
                                                               For the 12 Month period of
                                                                      st                  st
                                                        (September 1 2017 – August 31 2018)
 # of calls answered by 311                                216,464 (average of 18,038/month)
 % first call resolution                                                     41%
 % direct transfers by name/extension                                        24%
 French Calls                                                               3.80%
                                                                            July 10
 Heaviest Day                                                      1207 calls answered
 Average Talk Time                                                         1:02mins
 % Abandoned Calls                                                          4.16%
 Active Time per day                                    52.02% active (talk time & after-call work)
                                                                33.67% on calls (talk time)

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Customer Service Strategy 2019-2022

 Calls Answered After Threshold (20
                                                                       14.62%
 seconds)
 Calls Abandoned After Threshold                                        3.26%
                                                                     Solid Waste

                                                                  Roads Department

                                                                   Tax Department

                                                                   Building Services

 Top 5 Calls by Department                                        By-law Enforcement

 # of calls received After Hours                                        32,974
 # of ACR case created by 311                                           33255
                                                                   Blue Box Request

                                                                       Potholes

                                                                  Green Cart Request

                                                                       Plowing

                                                                  Garbage Collection

 Top 5 ACR Case Types
 Emails Received @311 (started tracking in                              5,707
 May 2017)

Best Practice
Assessing “best practice” included a review of other municipalities and organizations that have reviewed
their customer service approaches and established customer service strategies. These include: Windsor,
Ajax, Barrie, Brantford, Brampton, Regina, Markham, Kawartha Lakes, Oshawa, Kingston, Burlington,
Winnipeg and Halton Region.
Common themes found as part of this best practice review include:

     Consistency across channels: organizations embarking on customer service strategies recognize
         the importance of ensuring a seamless experience for the customer, regardless of which channel
         they use to engage with the municipality (ie, website, telephone, email, in person). It is
         customer service best practice to resolve as many calls as possible at the first point of contact.
         Most municipalities are continuously working to have the knowledge in 311 to resolve more
         calls on behalf of departments. Several municipalities have knowledgebases, which are a
         centralized source of reliable and accurate information across the corporation.

     Role clarity and staff empowerment: organization leaders must be role models when it comes
         to customer service and understand and support a customer-oriented service standard. This is
         demonstrated in several ways, especially with training and tools for staff who deliver customer
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         service, and by processes and a culture where staff are empowered to make decisions “in the
         moment” about how to provide excellent customer service. Many municipalities recognize
         employees who go the extra mile to provide good customer service, in order to reward their
         efforts and to set examples for other staff

     Timeliness: there is a substantive focus on standards designed to ensure that responses are
         provided within a reasonable timeframe and that issue resolution is timely. This is supported by
         a framework to guide the consistent provision of quality customer service. Several of the
         municipalities surveyed have formal service standards. The standards are set corporately (eg.
         “External emails will receive a response within two business days”). The standards are meant to
         represent response or service delivery expectations under normal operation.

     Rigorous measurement and benchmarking: organizations that excel at customer service
         measure and evaluate the customer experience within their organization. This includes regular
         surveys using a variety of tools such as mystery shoppers and quantitative data such as first call
         resolution ratios.

     Access: several examples exist of municipalities enhancing the customer experience by adopting
         different operating hours (a review of 311 operating hours is currently underway), expanded
         services at some locations, and “one-stop shop” counters. This is consistent with, for example,
         the City of Greater Sudbury’s current approach of using Citizen Service Centres throughout the
         community in various municipal service buildings. Most municipalities plan to leverage
         technology more in the coming years. For instance, citizens want more options to pay their bills,
         register for programs and submit applications online. 311 Chat is currently emerging as a
         channel option in other municipalities, and is typically the channel with the highest level of
         customer satisfaction and the lowest effort.
Staff also interviewed several other municipalities and conducted a site visit at Halton Region. Halton is
an example of a municipality that is recognized for its customer service excellence. It has been awarded
the Service Quality Measurement (SQM) Group’s annual award for the highest customer service in
government, for a number of years. This recognizes government organizations based on their rate of
First Call Resolution (FCR) – which is the number of calls required to resolve an issue, answer a question
or receive a requested service. The data from Halton reflects a high performing call centre:

     90% of Halton Region callers made only one call to get their matter resolved. The average top
      performing call centre FCR score is 84% and the average government FCR score is 76%.
     92% of callers were satisfied overall with their call centre experience.
     96% of customers were satisfied overall with the customer service representative who handled
      their call.

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Citizens First Study
The ICCS is a Canadian institute established in the late 1990s to sustain and further develop efforts to
improve citizen satisfaction with public sector service delivery in Canada. The Citizens First study is a
study that has been conducted every couple of years since 1998. It establishes measures with respect to
citizens’ satisfaction with and expectations of service from Canadian government, at all levels.
The Citizens First 8 report notes that the five drivers of client satisfaction that represent the greatest
opportunity to improve the service experience are:
     Issue Resolution/Future Issues

     Timely Help
     Timeliness
     Extra Mile
     Access (Telephone)

According to the Citizens First 8 report, more should be done by governments to manage client
expectations for service delivery. It improves customer service overall and also reduces the amount of
complaints and call backs from citizens, which could increase staff efficiency. The study also outlines the
difference between service standards and service expectations – for instance:
     Most expect to get required information or start a transaction within 7 minutes on the phone,
      but actual government services do not always meet this expectation.The average number of
      minutes Canadians are willing to search for information for a routine service on a government
      website is 5 minutes which reflects a shift toward even shorter times in the most recent study.
     Since 2016, the usage of the phone channel for government service is remaining steady. The
      usage of digital services (online and email) is slightly increasing, and in-person visits are slightly
      decreasing.

     Half of online service users are interested in using social media to connect with government and
      two thirds of citizens agree that they would check to see if services are available online before
      going in-person or phoning.

Research Summary
Generally speaking, the research can be summarized with the following themes.

1. Customer Service Culture:
a. Employees and residents alike feel that organizational culture/attitude should be improved.

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b. Most residents are satisfied with the current level of customer service provided by the City. In the
2016 Citizen Survey, 78% of citizens were very satisfied or somewhat satisfied with the customer service
they receive from the City. In the recent public Customer Service Survey, 70% of citizens were satisfied
or very satisfied (it is worth noting there was a low response rate to this survey). A lack of timely
response from staff was the most common concern from citizens.
c. CGS Staff ranked “Customer service culture” low in importance in the 2016 employee feedback
survey. The Citizens First reports show that the relatively low overall placement of in the list of
important issues is an indicator of a need for change. High-performing organizations place a high value
on, and understand how to influence, customer service culture.
d. Many municipalities recognize employees who go the extra mile to provide good customer service, in
order to reward their efforts and to set examples for other staff.
e. According to Citizens First 8, the drivers which have the most potential to impact customer
satisfaction are: Issue Resolution/Future Issues, Timely Help, Timeliness, Extra Mile and Access
(Telephone).

2. Customer Service Standards:
a. According to the Citizens First 8 report, more should be done by governments to manage client
expectations for service delivery. It improves customer service overall and also reduces the amount of
complaints and call backs from citizens, which could increase staff efficiency.
b. Several of the municipalities surveyed have formal service standards. The standards are set
corporately (eg. “External emails will receive a response within two business days”). The standards are
meant to represent response or service delivery expectations under normal operation.
c. Some divisions have long-standing norms that address aspects of what would be included in a
corporate set of standards, but these have not traditionally been communicated to the public.
d. Norms regarding customer service standards for email or phone transactions do not yet exist across
the organization. This will be addressed in the Customer Service Strategy.

3. Training and Procedures:
a. Many municipalities are implementing customer service training which is required to be taken by all
existing and new staff. The training typically includes best practices, dealing with difficult customers and
a section dedicated to issues that might be encountered for specific jobs.
b. Resource allocation decisions did not historically sufficiently address corporate customer service
needs, resulting in inadequate training for staff and inconsistent service experiences.
c. Escalations and complaints are handled differently across the organization.
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4. Technology:
a. Most municipalities plan to leverage technology more in the coming years. For instance, citizens want
more options to pay their bills, register for programs and submit applications online.
b. There is an opportunity to more fully and effectively utilize the City’s Customer Relationship
Management system.
c. 311 Chat is currently emerging as a channel option in other municipalities, and is typically the channel
with the highest level of customer satisfaction and the lowest effort.
d. According to Citizens First 8: “Online and social media provide government and citizens the
opportunity to connect in new ways. Governments should take advantage of these opportunities, while
still continuing to connect with citizens who have not adopted new technology using more traditional
channels.”

5. Knowledge/Information Sharing:
a. CGS sections indicated that improving information sharing, communication or education about their
services would help them to provide better customer service.
b. Many sections indicated that misdirected requests, not knowing who to contact or not understanding
what other areas do is a current barrier to good customer service.
c. Several municipalities have knowledgebases, which are a centralized source of reliable and accurate
information across the corporation. The City currently has a knowledgebase for 311, but there is a lot of
potential for it to be improved on and used by other sections of the City.

6. 311 Call Centre
a. Many municipalities have a dial-by-name directory, which allows citizens to reach known staff without
having to wait in the call queue and reduces the amount of time operators spend handling direct
transfers (which currently account for 25% of calls to our 311 service).
b. It is customer service best practice to resolve as many calls as possible at the first point of contact.
Most municipalities are continuously working to have the knowledge in 311 to resolve more calls on
behalf of departments. Depending on the number of calls being moved to the call centre, sometimes
staff are transitioned to 311 to increase capacity to handle those calls.
c. After hours, the City’s emergency calls (eg. flooding, traffic light outages, sinkholes) are currently
handled by a contractor, but the contractor does not always have the knowledge/ability to handle
requests for information about City services and less urgent requests for service (eg. missed garbage
collection, requests for by-law information). A review of 311 operating hours is underway.

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