Agenda item

To consider the attached report of the Director of Governance.

The Head of Corporate Services presented the Performance Report and Actions for Quarter 1 2017/18.

There were 31 Green Performance Indicators (89% of total indicators), 1 Amber Indicator (3%) and 3 Red Indicators (8%) for Quarter 1 2017/18.

The red performance indicators for Quarter 1 2017/18 were as followed:

·        EKS026d      (Average call waiting time in minutes)

·        HOU010a     (Number of households living in Temporary Accommodation including B&B)

·        HOU010b     (Number of households in bed and breakfast)

Members were advised that the figures for HOU010a and HOU010b were based on the number of households in accommodation on the last day of the quarter.

EKS026d

The Director of Shared Services advised that performance in the customer contact centre was below target due to a number of pressures. In addition to resource pressures from staffing levels, there were also some exceptional issues that had impacted in the Quarter.

Staffing was impacted by the ongoing need to hold vacancies and reduce staffing due to budget constraints. The introduction of a new phone system had impacted on performance due to temporary technical issues during the implementation phase. Also a failure in the automated call handling system had meant that calls had had to be manually handled for a period that had increased pressure in the service. There had also been an increase in calls during the quarter due to the elections and the introduction of the new Council Tax Support scheme, all of which had added increased volumes.

The Director stated that due the combination of factors creating a reduction in the average call wait time, it was hoped that EKS would be able to ‘claw back’ the performance to target in the next Quarter.

In response to a question it was stated by the Director of Shared Services that the decision to withdraw face-to-face services at the Deal Area Office would not have a significant impact on performance. Members were advised that it was part of the plan to help recover performance as the staff from the Area Offices would be redeployed to the contact centre to occupy gaps in posts that remained funded but which had been held open in order to contribute to vacancy management targets.

In addition, customer services handled in excess of 28,000 calls per month for Dover District Council and the number of visits to the Deal Area Office was a small fraction of this figure (800-900 enquiries per month). The Director explained that the extra two staff that would be redeployed to the contact centre would be expected to handle 150 - 200 customer queries per day between them.

HOU010a and HOU010b

The Head of Finance, Housing and Community advised that the Council was looking at a number of measures to avoid using bed and breakfast accommodation and a new team leader had been employed on the housing allocation team. The Council was also investigating using modular housing to deliver additional accommodation.

East Kent Housing

Members were advised that the performance of EKMH5 (Percentage of properties with a valid gas safety certification), which was an Amber indicator, was due to problems with corrupted data but this had been resolved and servicing was now at 100%.

In respect of the performance indicators for arrears, Members were advised that these were cumulative. There was no target for the level of arrears in the performance report but the general pattern for arrears was that over the course of the year the arrears would be recovered by Quarter 4. 

It was agreed that a report would be made to the next meeting on the impact of benefit changes on rent arrears.

Parks and Open Spaces

Members were advised that the quarterly focus was Parks and Open Spaces. The Head of Parks and Open Spaces advised that four teams had been brought together to form the new Parks and Open Spaces team and that six months into operation the overall performance was positive.

The Head of Corporate Services advised that he would investigate why performance indicator PLA007 had no target shown.

RESOLVED: That it be recommended to the Cabinet that the Council’s Performance Report and Actions for Quarter 1, 2017/18 be noted.