Customer First

We are committed to providing high quality services for all of the people we serve. We provide a wide range of services which we will deliver and develop to meet your needs.

Our Commitment sets out the standards of customer service you can expect from East Ayrshire Council. Our Customer First Service Commitment is available at every public access point in our buildings and on the Council website.

We will:

• treat you fairly and with respect
• expect you to treat our staff with respect
• offer a friendly and polite service and be sensitive to your needs
• deal with your communications promptly
• deal with your enquiry at first point of contact, wherever possible
• make best use of technology to enable service improvements
• do our best to help you and let you know how quickly we can take action
• provide easy to understand information about the services we provide
• make information and services accessible online
• deal with your feedback positively and quickly
• keep your details confidential as far as possible

In our offices

In our offices we will:

• have user-friendly public offices, with clean and tidy reception areas
• provide up-to-date leaflets that are clear, easy to understand and available in other formats and languages if required
• deal with all of your enquiries about any Council service, contacting the appropriate Council service as required
• have clear signs and display our opening hours in all our offices
• clearly display how you can make a complaint
• have induction loops for those who require them in all our public offices
• provide a private interview room if you need one

On the phone

On the phone we will:

• answer the phone within five rings whenever possible
• give you our name when we answer your call to let you know who you are speaking to
• deal with your enquiry on the spot if we can
• advise you what we can do to assist and by when, or tell you why we cannot help (if we cannot help you immediately, we will try to tell you who can)
• if you call and the person you need to speak to is not in the office and you leave a message on their voicemail or with another member of staff, we will return your call within one working day

Correspondence

In correspondence we will:

• answer your correspondence within seven working days of receiving it, or keep you updated if an answer will take longer
• make our communications clear and easy to understand
• arrange for letters to be translated, interpreted over the phone, or made available in large print or Braille if you ask us

Face-to-face

Face-to-face we will:

• meet you within ten minutes if you have an appointment
• advise you how long you may have to wait and who will meet you if you do not have an appointment
• offer to make you an appointment if you cannot wait
• phone the National Interpreting Service immediately if you need their services
• wear identification badges
• offer you somewhere private to talk to us if appropriate
• arrange an interview with someone of the same sex if you request this
• enable you to bring along a friend, relative or support worker to your appointment
• help you to fill in Council forms if you need help
• try to make other arrangements if you cannot visit our offices
• show you identification if we need to visit you in your own home

Complaints

If you do have a complaint, we will:

• make it easy for you to complain by making our comments, suggestions and complaints leaflet available at every public access point in public buildings and on our website
• try to sort out your complaint on the spot if we can
• respond to your complaint within five working days in the first instance, or keep you updated with the reason for the delay (in Social Work, different legal standards apply)
• tell you what you can do next if you are still not happy