Fusion21

Golden Gates Housing Trust Continue to Deliver Excellent Customer Service

Golden Gates Housing Trust (GGHT) have been recognised for delivering outstanding service to its customers. Following an onsite assessment in June, the Trust were shown to have once again achieved the Customer Service Excellence Accreditation.

The Customer Service Excellence Accreditation is the Government’s Standard for customer service and is designed to be a driver of continuous improvement. The assessment criteria consists of 57 elements including customer insight, culture of the organisation and quality of service.

The assessor spoke to staff, residents and partner organisations including Fusion21, before making the final decision and concluded that GGHT met all 57 criteria with only two partial compliances. He looked at a range of evidence on how GGHT understands who its customers are, how it shapes it services to meet their needs and works in partnership with others to improve services.

GGHT’s Head of Policy, Performance and Governance Fiona Graham said: “Achieving this accreditation is a real testament to the commitment of our staff, who take their customers’ experience very seriously. This acknowledges that GGHT recognises the importance of developing an in-depth understanding of its customers’ needs and delivering customer service according to their expectations.”

Andrew Mackay from the Centre for Assessment, said that “Beyond any doubt, Golden Gates Housing Trust meets the requirements of Customer Service Excellence. All staff involved the assessment were keen to provide evidence in support of the application and it was evident that they share a clear pride in what they do. Staff demonstrated a real passion for developing and delivering services which consistently meet the needs and expectations of their customers.”

News of the achievement comes hot on the heels of GGHT’s HR department being named Human Resources team of the year at the 2011 Housing Heroes Awards. The Trust is also one of a select number of organisations to have been given the Investors in People gold award.