RESIDENTS are happier than ever with Stratford District Council.
The authority’s Customer Satisfaction Index (CSI) is repeated every two years to allow the council to gauge its performance from residents’ perspective, and to highlight areas where improvement was needed. A questionnaire was sent to 5,000 randomly selected households over the summer, and just over 800 provided feedback.
Overall satisfaction with the council was the highest it had been since the survey started – with four out of five residents happy with the council’s performance.
Cleaning up and money handling brought the council’s best service scores – 86.6 per cent for refuse and recycling, and 83.9 per cent council tax – but dealing with planning applications was the lowest rated service with a 69.9 per cent satisfaction rate,
All services actually saw an increase in their overall score, notably leisure centres (+2.9 per cent), street cleaning (+2.5 per cent) and refuse/recycling (+2.4 per cent).
Compared against all 78 requirements used, the highest scoring areas were collection of food waste in green bins, the opening times of council offices, and the ease of moving wheelie bins around.
The lowest scoring, which the council has earmarked as top priorities for improvement, were explaining planning decisions and the cost of car parking.
The overall 79 per cent score was compared with national CSI data, and was higher than sectors including telecommunications, utilities, national and local public services, transport and financial institutions.
Council leader Coun Chris Saint leader: “The council is grateful to all those residents who took the trouble to respond to our survey to provide us with such valuable feedback.
“We have modelled our service provisions on the feedback from past years. Using the Customer Satisfaction Index, we can continue to deliver what is important to our residents.”
