Suggestions put forward to address eThekwini’s call centre woes

FOLLOWING up on complaints from residents regarding a lack of response from eThekwini Municipality’s Electricity Customer Contact Centre, Democratic Alliance eThekwini caucus leader, Councillor Nicole Graham, visited the centre last week.

The eThekwini Municipality’s Electricity Customer Contact Centre is where all calls, emails and WhatsApp messages to the department are captured and sent to the technical teams.

Graham said there are currently significant problems facing this centre and many Durbanites are furious at having their calls or messages left unanswered.

Commenting on what she found on her visit, Graham said: “Prior to March, there were 30 staff answering calls on a shift and four staff attending to WhatsApp. This has now come down to 12 and two respectively as desks had to be moved out to make space for distancing. A second room has been set up, which should enable that capacity to double engage within the next week or so,” she said.

ALSO READ: Strike action leads to postal delays with municipal bills 

Graham said another issue – and one that the public aren’t told about – is that the offices are disinfected during shift change.

This means no one is answering phones between 5am and 6am, 1pm and 2pm and 9pm and 10pm. She said there is no capacity on the current system to let consumers know this when they call.

“There will soon be a changeover to a new system that is more modern. Council has already approved the budget and all call centres in eThekwini will run on it. This will help the system be a bit more modern and advanced,” she said.

Graham said the current dropped call and waiting time averages were ‘ridiculous’, and that she had written to the Head of Electricity with a number of practical suggestions.

These include trying to halve the time used for shift changes and looking at increasing the staff per shift, getting a business WhatsApp to enable the WhatsApp reporting to be more organised and getting faultsmen to give approximate lead times to the contact centres that can be smsed to consumers to avoid people have to repeatedly call back for information.

She has also suggested requesting monthly reports to the committee on dropped call and waiting time averages, which are then public, to ensure oversight and accountability.

“This centre has been hit hard by Covid-19 but was also battling prior. The management were very friendly and open about their challenges and keen to engage, which is always appreciated. Let’s hope when there are more staff on shift there will be some improvement, and that some of our recommendations will be considered. After all, paying customers deserve good service,” she said.

Caxton Local Media Covid-19 reporting

Dear reader,
As your local news provider, we have the duty of keeping you factually informed on Covid-19 developments. As you may have noticed, mis- and disinformation (also known as “fake news”) is circulating online. Caxton Local Media is determined to filter through the masses of information doing the rounds and to separate truth from untruth in order to keep you adequately informed. Local newsrooms follow a strict pre-publication fact-checking protocol. A national task team has been established to assist in bringing you credible news reports on Covid-19.
Readers with any comments or queries may contact National Group Editor Irma Green (irma@caxton.co.za) or Legal Adviser Helene Eloff (helene@caxton.co.za).

At the time of going to press, the contents of this feature mirrored South Africa’s lockdown regulations.

Do you want to receive news alerts via Telegram? Send us a message (not an sms) with your name and surname to 060 532 5535.

You can also join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

PLEASE NOTE: If you have signed up for our news alerts you need to save the Berea Mail Telegram number as a contact to your phone, otherwise you will not receive our alerts

Here’s where you can download Telegram on Android or Apple.