Page last updated 24/05/02
Extract from an article which appeared in The Express and Star ~ 1 February 2000 ~ Reproduced by kind permission.
Council celebrates as four
pick up prestigious award
By Susan Leigh
Peter Martin (building consultancy), Pam Marchant (cashiers), Joanne Bailey (pensions) and Nigel Brown (development control) celebrate the council's success
Wolverhampton Council is today celebrating after achieving the prestigious Charter Mark award for four of its departments.
Pensions administration, finance cashiers’ service technical services building consultancy and technical services planning development control were among the 700 winners nationwide.
The winners were announced today (1 February 2000) in London. The Charter Mark is the Government's scheme for recognising and encouraging excellence in public service, concentrating on the service the customer actually receives.
The four departments applied for the award because they felt that they put the users first and in so doing, delivered a first-class customer service.
Councillors
Andrew Johnson, chairman
of the finance and general purposes committee, Roger Lawrence, chairman
of the West Midlands Pensions
Fund and John McCallum, chairman
of the planning and environment
committee jointly welcomed the
news.
"These achievements clearly demonstrate the council's commitment to working with staff and customers to deliver excellent success," they said.
"This is a visible way of underlining the council's pledge of good service to the people and businesses in our town."
Pensions administration has succeeded in achieving the award, which is presented for a three-year period, for the second time, the last being in 1996.
Mike Woodall, chief pensions officer, said "It is the ultimate accolade and, having won it once before, a continuous validation that we are providing a quality service to our customers".
Pension
“It is about making sure we are providing a service
in the best way we can to the customer and providing it at the time the customer requires it.”
The division is responsible for the £5 billion West Midlands Pensions Fund, one of the largest local authority pension funds with some 173,OO0 members.
It has received numerous
industry-wide acknowledgements for its commitment to raising local and national standards.
The cashiers service
processes around half a million transactions a year, worth £175 million.
Kath Cartwright, service
development officer, said "Our cashiers see people on a day to-day basis and receive a lot of queries.
A common query was regarding the location of special needs facilities in the Civic entre and, as a result, we produced a public guide detailing where these facilities were and introduced special facilities and information for customers who are visually impaired."
Clerk cashier Pam Haynes who has been working for the department for 18 years said they had become much more customer focused through listening to what the customers were asking for and trying to accommodate them.
The council's a building consultancy, which delivers a local authority building control service in direct competition with private sector approved inspectors, was also a Charter Mark winner.
Measures
Peter
Martin, group building manager of technical services, said "The CharterMark is an achievement and a reflection on the way we present this service".
“We actively seek the opinions and suggestions from our customers which include developers, architects and builders, in order to continually improve the service.”
The development of an electronic transfer of plans and specifications is among the innovative measures introduced as a result.
Development control which advises the planning and environment committee on the regulation of land use and development in the public interest was also recognised for its good work.
Nigel Brown, head of development control, said "Our job is to improve the environment in which people live and the image of the town when visitors arrive.
"The award recognises how we get across the reasons for decisions made on a particular planning application."
All winning services have published service standards or charters, which have been developed through consultation with users and staff.
Wolverhampton’s Charter Mark winners have responded positively to the government's Modernising Government White Paper published last year.
This sets out the government's vision for a more co-ordinated approach to policy making and the need for public services to listen to and respond to their users and staff.
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