Government Call Centres fail to answer up to 25% of calls

Following last week’s blog about customer service telephone centres and the lack of authority the person answering the call has, my ears pricked up during the news this morning when it was reported that there had been a rise in complaints about the HM Revenue and Customs call centres. It took some digging around to find out the numbers, but believe me they were worth the dig!

According to an article published earlier this month in CCF (Call Centre Focus) Magazine, latest figures show an increase of a third in the number of complaints made about the Treasury’s call centre. In 2008/2009 they received 7,644 complaints, a staggering 1,739 increase on the year before. That’s more than 25 complaints a day. And that is only the call centre complaints – in total the Treasury received more than 87,000 customer complaints last year.

Lesley Strathie, HMRC chief executive told a House of Commons Treasury Committee that ‘a very large chunk of those complaints have been about rudeness or tone or the way that we handled them rather than the subject matter in the first instance’. Surely this is worse??!! By the nature of the subject you would expect complaints – who doesn’t complain a little about paying tax? But for the complaint to be about how the enquiry was handled that is very alarming! Ms Strathie did however add that steps had been taken to address how calls were handled.

I wonder if one of the steps was to just not answer at all? (I hope you are sitting down…you may want to place a cushion on the desk to provide a soft landing for your jaw) 43% of all calls made to the department were unanswered! Yes, 43%! Apparently this was during its busiest periods and that at the times of year when they were less busy only 25% of calls were unanswered. Their target is 10% unanswered.

Imagine if you transferred those attainment figures versus targets to other customer facing roles? If you and three colleagues visit a Michelin Restaurant in a quiet period one of you could expect to go hungry? At least in busy periods there would be two of you keeping each other company!

I’m guessing that perhaps one of the causes of this, is that staff morale is ‘at a low’ – another conclusion of the report. Treasury committee chairman, Michael Fallon said: ‘We are particularly alarmed by the low staff morale and engagement at HMRC, and its effect on performance. We are deeply troubled by the apparent absence of any plan to ameliorate the situation, and call on HMRC management to re-double their efforts here.’

I wonder what sort of Management Development and Investment there is…after all surely they count in the staff that are demoralised? In a study of professional service firms, the Hay Group found that offices with engaged employees were up to 43% more productive…that would certainly be heading towards Michael Fallon’s wishes.