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Purpose of the Plan

This Plan sets out the Council’s vision for future service delivery. Despite difficult financial times we will continue to deliver services that help improve and maintain the outstanding quality of life in East Devon.

We will:

1. design and manage our services in a way that delivers what matters to our customers;

2. cut out waste, bureaucracy and inefficiency to reduce the time it takes to make a decision as well as bring down costs;

3. tailor services to individual customers so that no matter how a resident contacts us, whether it be by email, through our website, on the phone or in person, we have the right skill or information in place to deliver what they need at that point;

4. exploit the benefits of digital technologies to help our staff and customers access information and services however, wherever and whenever they choose whilst continuing to provide face to face services and home visits to suit people’s needs.

Principles of the Plan

We will work with customers to understand what is important to them and how we can best deliver what matters by adopting the following customer service principles:

1. Find out what matters to customers and cost effectively design services to meet this demand

2. Tailor our service delivery to our demographics and customer "shapes"

3. Design services so that, wherever possible, we deal with a customer’s enquiry there and then no matter which is their preferred way of contacting us

4. Make all services accessible through the web and help residents make the most of this style of service, but make sure phone and face to face contact is available for those who want or need it

5. Understand that first impressions count and that customer perception is important to us

6. Treat customers as you, yourself, would want and expect to be treated

7. To a customer, the council is a joined-up system which means we must make it so

8. We always want to know what our residents think about our service and will consult on changes to the shape and future of the district or your local area

9. We will measure the things that tell us whether we are responsive services delivering what matters to our customers (end to end times, preventable demand analysis, one stop analysis and the top issues being worked on to meet our services’ ‘purpose’ and improve service delivery).