FOI request details
Request
Subject: Complaints
Reference: WBC-FOI-00465
I am writing to make an open government request for information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. I would like answers to the questions below to be provided to me via email.
Q1 How many complaints have you received from citizens between 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 (inclusive) about the following:
a. Council tax - e.g., payment, council tax bands, etc.
b. Residential building maintenance - e.g., for council housing and council-owned apartment blocks
c. Facilities maintenance - e.g., leisure facilities, libraries, parks, playgrounds
d. Infrastructure maintenance - e.g., roads, footpaths, etc.
e. Refuse and recycling collection - e.g., late or missed collections
Q2 As per above, how many of these complaints were about poor communication - e.g., citizens receiving letters, emails, phone calls etc. late; relevant departments not responding to queries; no option to communicate over specific channels (e.g., social media, text, etc.); recipients claiming they didn't receive messages:
a. Council tax - e.g., payment, council tax bands, etc.
b. Residential building maintenance - e.g., for council housing and council-owned apartment blocks
c. Facilities maintenance - e.g., leisure facilities, libraries, parks, playgrounds
d. Infrastructure maintenance - e.g., roads, footpaths, etc.
e. Refuse and recycling collection - e.g., late or missed collections
Q3 For the following question, if possible, please answer for each of the categories in questions 1 and 2, using the attached grid. However, if this will take too long, please share the total numbers.
Did any of these complaints have the following consequences:
a. The need to re-send updated bills or other charges
b. Delays in payment
c. The need to issue refunds to citizens or others
d. Council officers being unable to access council citizen's properties
e. An inability for citizens to access council facilities - e.g., leisure centres, libraries
f. Delays to essential work - e.g., maintenance of council housing, maintenance of council-owned apartment blocks, maintenance of leisure facilities, maintenance of infrastructure such as roads
Q4 How many requests between 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 (inclusive) have you received from citizens requesting to move from paper/postal channels to digital - e.g., email, online portal, text or phone call?
Q5 Have you invested in the following from 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 (inclusive)?
a. New technologies to improve communication with citizens, - e.g., opening different channels of communication, automated online chat, analysing and mapping resident behaviour on services
b. New services from outside providers that will improve the way you can communicate with citizens - e.g., help desks, services that will manage invoicing, services that will manage enquires
c. Additional training for staff on how to communicate with citizens
Q6 If possible, which of the following areas are you planning on investing in 2023?
a. New technologies to improve communication with citizens, e.g., opening different channels of communication
b. New services from outside providers that will improve the way you can communicate with citizens
c. Additional training for staff on how to communicate with citizens
Q7 Which of the following problems have you encountered between 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 (inclusive)?
a. Citizen information, such as address, phone number or email, that is out of date or incorrect
b. Citizen information, such as address, phone number or email, that cannot be easily accessed, for instance because it is held on different filing systems
c. Online portals, such as to contact the council, to access leisure services, to book collections or maintenance, not working properly, for example, data is hard to input or retrieve, or the portal often crashes
Q8 How many requests between 1st January 2022 to 31st December 2022 (inclusive) have you received from citizens asking to change their data?
Response
None Disclosed - 14 February 2023
In accordance with section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, we are not obliged to comply with your request as the process of identifying, locating, retrieving and, where appropriate, extracting the information would exceed the 'appropriate limit' as defined by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004. This is currently £450 and equates to 18 hours of dedicated staff time. We estimate that to process your request and would take significantly in excess of 18 hours.
The Housing and Regeneration Department receives on average 300 complaints per year. In order to provide the information for Qs 1-3 for the period in question, each complaint would have to be located and reviewed individually (to ascertain the topic of the complaint, also check to see if they were about poor communication and fit the categories listed for Q3), as this level of detail is not recorded on the Department's database. At a conservative estimate of 20-30 minutes to locate and review each complaint received during the period in question, it would take 100-150 hours to provide the information requested.
Furthermore, information for Qs 7 and 8 would require us to check the files of all of our tenants and leaseholders. Therefore, in order to provide the information, we would need to locate and review each individual file. There are an estimated 33,000 files to review and it would take a conservative estimate of 5 minutes to review each file, which in total would take a further 2,750 hours to provide this information.
Please note that the above time estimate is only for the Housing and Regeneration department; the total time required for each of the teams referred to in this request would be greater than this.
You may wish to narrow the scope of your request. For example, the Housing and Regeneration Department could provide part of the information for Qs 5c, and 6c within 18 hours. The Council Tax team have also indicated that questions 5 and 6 could be answered within the appropriate limit.
Please note that our responses were accurate to the best of our knowledge at the time of release, and have not subsequently been updated. This information should be considered an historical record only.