Essex County Council: Finding Root Causes of Dissatisfaction
Customer Company Size
Large Corporate
Region
- Europe
Country
- United Kingdom
Product
- Aptean Respond
Tech Stack
- Business Intelligence
- Quality Assurance
Implementation Scale
- Enterprise-wide Deployment
Impact Metrics
- Productivity Improvements
- Customer Satisfaction
Technology Category
- Application Infrastructure & Middleware - Data Exchange & Integration
Applicable Industries
- Cities & Municipalities
Applicable Functions
- Quality Assurance
Services
- System Integration
About The Customer
Essex County Council is an upper tier local authority based in Chelmsford and is the main public sector body in Essex. The council looks after highways, social care, infrastructure and education, amongst other responsibilities. The council has been using Respond, Aptean’s Complaints and Feedback Management solution, since 2008 to manage inbound enquiries and complaints, including Local Government Ombudsman (LGO) complaints, Chief Executive correspondence, Corporate and social care statutory complaints, Member service enquiries (a service which is provided for County Councillors), and Freedom of Information and Environmental Impact Regulation requests. While the initial Respond system at Essex CC was fit for purpose at the time of implementation, Essex CC realised that both its own technology and that of Respond had moved on considerably since then.
The Challenge
Essex County Council (Essex CC) had been using the Respond system from Aptean since 2008 to manage inbound enquiries and complaints. However, as technology and the council's own processes evolved, the older version of Respond was struggling to meet the council's needs. The council needed greater clarity in reporting on the data within Respond, which the earlier version was struggling to support. A lack of Business Intelligence (BI) made it difficult for Essex CC to find root causes of issues and to take preventive action on them across the council. The council also had a requirement to publicly report on statutory complaints data, which was difficult to extract using the earlier version of Respond. The reporting process overall was a very manual one, including running different reports and then merging them outside of the system. The council also identified inefficiencies in the Quality Assurance (QA) process, which was manual and time-consuming, and left ample room for error. The council needed a simple interface which would display a user’s progress, as well as allow them to choose from a longer list of enquiry or complaint types that could be updated when needed.
The Solution
Essex CC decided that the most efficient solution would be to upgrade to the latest version of Respond, rather than starting from the ground up with a completely different solution. The upgrade would be able to support their ongoing requirements and provide them with the insights and efficiency they needed. The latest version of Respond is a leap forward in Case & Complaints Management technology, and this version was perfect for Essex CC to align with its improved internal processes. Working closely with Aptean’s Customer Solutions team, the upgrade was completed on the last day of March and was in use by the council’s employees two days later. The latest version of Respond features new and improved tools that have given Essex CC the clarity they needed regarding their reporting, as well as manageable workflow and QA processes.
Operational Impact
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