************************************************
In response to the findings of the Ombudsman's investigation into the handling of a case on missing animal by 1823 Call Centre (1823), a spokesman of the Efficiency Unit (EU) said today (June 2) that the unit generally agrees with the recommendations of The Ombudsman and has already worked with the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD) to implement the suggested improvements.
Improvement measures implemented on handling cases on missing animals include:
(i) the 1823 will proactively provide contact details of respective Animal Management Centres of the AFCD to the public, for more convenient and direct checking of case update;
(ii) we rely on the information provided by the department to answer the caller's enquiries. Upon providing a final reply to the public direct, the AFCD has agreed to copy the final reply to 1823 in a speedy manner, in order to improve the communication between the two parties; and
(iii) to avoid misleading the public into believing that the staff who took her call was from the AFCD, we will clearly state the identity of the Customer Service Officer who mans the AFCD hotline in a more precise and accurate manner during transfer of calls.
The spokesman stressed that 1823 would continue to work actively with participating departments to further improve its services.
"1823 has introduced a series of improvement measures on complaint handling, particularly on improving case tracking and follow through to case resolution, with an aim of increasing public satisfaction," the spokesman said.
Stressing the commitment of the management and staff of 1823 to deliver a high quality service to the public, the spokesman said that major enhancement on case process flow, knowledge database, information technology support, manpower training and deployment was in progress, in order to meet the public's high expectation on government service.
Ends/Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Issued at HKT 12:55
NNNN
