Customer Survey

Over October and November 2007 we issued a Customer Satisfaction Survey to a random sample of customers who had been in contact with Stirling Council Council Tax, Benefits and Arrears Team, through either visiting Viewforth, by written correspondence or via our website. Listed below are some of the survey's key findings, which represent our customers views on the standard of service they have received from us. We will use this important feedback to develop an Action Plan of future service improvements.

Key Findings - Customer Services

92% of people felt that they were offered either good or very good service, which is a 9% improvement on the figures reported in 2006.
The number of customers who felt they received a poor service fell 2% to only 1.5% in 2007

Key Findings - Methods of Contact

52% of people contact us by telephone, with an encouraging 40% noting that our service has improved as a result of new telephone functionality introduced over the past year.
E-mail has decreased slightly in popularity from last year with only 6% choosing to contact us by this means.
7.5% of people make council tax and benefit enquiries through their local office, 2% less than last year.
However there has been nearly a 3% rise in people using our web services with the total percentage of contact through this means reaching 3.76% this year.
Less people now visit Viewforth with a 9% drop this year to 11.3%.
Fewer people write to us as well with a 5% drop on last years figure to 16.5%.

Key Findings - Online

Encouragingly 42% of people knew about the self service web options for Council Tax payments and balances, which is a 7% increase from 2006, reflecting the growing use of online services.
There has been a 6% rise in awareness of our online benefits calculator with now 24% of people knowing about this facility.

Key Findings - Council Tax Billing and Arrears

86.2% of Stirling citizens found their Council Tax bills easy to read.
85% found Council Tax reminders and arrear letters easy to understand.
The percentage of customers who found the correspondence difficult to read stayed around 5%, the numbers who thought the correspondence was easy to read and informative fell by 20% on last year's.

Key Findings - Benefits Application Process

22% of people applying for benefits found the application process difficult, but this fell to only 8% finding it difficult to apply for Council Tax Discount.