Customer care to get a revamp
The City of Mbombela has admitted its customer-care service is not up to scratch and promised to have a new 24-hour set-up running by the end of May this year.
Nelspruit Post recently received a number of complaints from residents who struggled to contact municipal employees telephonically.
A businesswoman who represents several companies in the city, said she simply wanted a basic public service.
Nobody answers the phones at the municipality. When you go there physically, you can see the system is a mess. I can’t always jump in the car in the middle of a working day to drive to the civic centre to sort out a problem,” she said.
“What about the elderly people who are phoning from their cellphones? They cannot afford to hold while they are transferred by the switchboard from one number to another.”
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Municipal spokesman, Mr Joseph Ngala said the matter was being dealt with accordingly.
“After the amalgamation of the two former municipalities, there were obviously some issues. We are a bigger institution now and need to provide better service.
We know that as a customer you may feel like you are being pushed from pillar to post. This is not acceptable,” Ngala said.
He added that there was staff placement in process and the new system would include the tracking of issues or complaints, and real-time responses would be a priority.
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At present, any emergency calls to the municipality go through to the fire department after normal working hours. According to Ngala, transferring to the fire department is no longer an option, hence the plan for a 24-hour service.
The municipality’s website is outdated with some parts still reading “Mbombela Local Municipality”.
Another member of the public complained that he could not download the documents necessary to obtain bank details for his bill payments. He could also not reach anyone through the switchboard.
In the end, he had to go to a satellite office personally to gain access to the banking details so that he could go home and make an electronic transfer.
Ngala indicated that the website was being reconstructed and said he hoped it would be in full working order at the same time as the new customer-care system.
“We are aware the website is not user-friendly enough. We are working on it,” he said.
