Job Description

Overview

Join the Buckinghamshire Council Customer Service Team and Make a Difference!

Are you passionate about providing outstanding customer service? Do you have excellent IT skills and a desire to grow and develop in your career? If so, we have the perfect opportunity for you!

Buckinghamshire Council is seeking talented and dedicated Customer Service Advisors to join our team. This is your chance to put your skills into action and make a real difference in your community. With innovative technologies, great support for your development, and a warm, friendly, and caring work environment, this is a customer service role like no other!

These are Secondment/Fixed Term Contract opportunities for an initial 12-month period, with the potential for career growth and development within the council. We will be looking to appoint at Grade 2 which is a starting salary of \xc2\xa325,078 per annum. Applications for part-time work (3 or 4 full days or 5 half days) will be considered and the salary advertised would therefore be pro-rata. Please state in your application if you would like to be considered for part-time work.

Apply now and start your journey with Buckinghamshire Council!

About us

At Buckinghamshire Council, we\'re committed to creating a brighter tomorrow for our communities. We\'re making big changes, from increasing recycling to improving social care and health education. And we need people like you to help us make a real difference.

We value hard work and success, and we\'re proud to offer our employees a range of benefits. We promote a healthy work-life balance and flexible working arrangements. Our employees enjoy discounts at various cafes, restaurants, and shops, as well as auto-enrollment in our generous pension scheme. We also offer a salary sacrifice personal car lease scheme, membership to Costco, discounted gym memberships, travel discounts with Arriva, and much more.

Don\'t just take it from us, here is what some of our new joiners have had to say:

\xe2\x80\x9cMy onboarding experience has been great. The team here are really special and everyone has been so supportive and welcoming. The council are a fantastic organisation to work for and grow with; the benefits are good, the training is second to none and since starting in May, they have already reviewed our pay, awarded us with uplift payment\'s and advertised numerous opportunities to grow within the department. I\'m 31 years old and having worked in various roles and industries before, I finally feel like I\'m starting my career\xe2\x80\x9d.

\xe2\x80\x9cI have found the last few weeks since I started brilliant. Everyone is really happy to help (despite some probably easy questions being asked), nothing seems to be too much bother and everyone has been really welcoming\xe2\x80\x9d.

\xe2\x80\x9cI can confirm that my experience has been positive. I have enjoyed the friendly, helpful and welcoming environment in the office and the positive and encouraging culture\xe2\x80\x9d.

"It has been good to observe the emphasis on training and the range of training courses available for development opportunities. Thank you\xe2\x80\x9d.

About the role

Put simply, you\'ll be the voice of Buckinghamshire Council. Our Customer Service Centre receives around 432,000 calls,50,000 Contact Us forms and 20,000 web chats every year, between 9.00 am and 5:30pm. We also offer a face to face function at our offices where we assist around 9,000 customers every year. In this varied and vital role, you\'ll help us provide a helpful and reassuring response.

Switching between phone calls, emails and live web chats, the questions and concerns you answer will be as diverse as the people who contact us. Their enquiries will span everything from registering a birth to obtaining a waste permit, applying for Council Tax discounts to social care support, and more.

Our training will give you a host of specialist knowledge and skills. What\'s more, we\'ll support you to achieve a recognised, Level 2 Apprenticeship in Customer Service in your spare time. As we introduce new ideas, systems, and ways of working, you\'ll enjoy the chance to evolve with us. You\'ll also benefit from a highly competitive salary, with pay reviews that reward good performance.

In the Customer Service Centre we pride ourselves in giving our team exposure to the wide range of services provided by Buckinghamshire Council and facilitating career progression and are pleased to list social workers, team managers, data analysts, quality standards officers to name a few as our former colleagues who have developed from the start of their career in the Customer Service Centre.

About you

Whether you\'re seeking your first full-time role or looking to build on a great track record of customer service, you\'ll fit right in here. Because you really care about the people who contact us. Determined to make a difference, you know how to make connections with all sorts of people - by phone, online and in your friendly team. We\'ll expect you to be computer literate and to input data and use multiple systems at the same time. The skills to able to take accurate notes and complete forms while speaking with customers is required. Being a good multi-tasker and able to work at a fast pass is advantageous. We\'ll provide all the training you need in our systems.

Other information

Please see the attached job summary for further information.

We will be running an assessment day on: Date to be confirmed

If your application is successful, you will be invited to attend a morning or afternoon session which will consist of Try Before You Apply information, Group Exercises, and an interview.

Where our roles are customer-facing and you are required to speak to members of the public, the ability to converse at ease with customers and provide advice in accurate spoken English is essential for the role.

Our commitment to work-life balance and adapting ways of working is shaping our working lives for the better. We are currently operating a hybrid work style with 2 days in the office and 3 days working from home following a successful six month probation period. We are ideally looking for candidates who would be happy to work our Aylesbury office and support our face to face visitors.

This post is covered by the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and therefore applicants are required to declare:

• All unspent cautions and/or unspent convictions

For further information on how long it takes for cautions and convictions cautions to become spent, please refer to our guide on the

We reserve the right to close the vacancy once we have received sufficient applications, so please be advised to submit your application as early as possible.

Our values and culture

We have a set of values, which our employees have chosen, that represent what we are - Proud, Ambitious, Collaborative and Trustworthy.

By joining Buckinghamshire Council, you can expect:

• a fair and inclusive culture
• the chance to really make a difference to those around you
• health and well-being initiatives including an Employee Assistance Programme, Mental Health First Aiders and mindfulness workshops
• a unified voice through our Employee Representative Group
• ongoing support, and the opportunity to develop and progress in your career with us
• opportunities to take part in fun activities such as fundraising and social events

At Buckinghamshire Council, we know that our biggest strength comes from the people that work for us, and that\'s why we\'re working hard to ensure we continue to be an accessible and inclusive organisation.

From dedicated staff networks overseen by our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Steering Group, to proudly standing as a Disability Confident employer, it\'s important to us that all our colleagues feel engaged, listened to, and valued. Our offer of flexible working empowers a productive and happy workforce and allows employees to combine work with other responsibilities and commitments.

We believe our workforce should reflect the diverse communities we service in Buckinghamshire, and are looking for like-minded individuals to join us in promoting equality, fairness, and inclusion for everyone.

About the Business Unit

Resources cover a wide range of specialisms, including Human Resources, Finance, ICT and Business Operations. Our main focus is supporting the other directorates to provide the best possible service to our residents. To do that, we have to make sure we have the right people in the right roles across the organisation. From our finance teams, working strategically to ensure the best value from public money; to HR keeping our employees healthy and happy, each service is vital in making sure Buckinghamshire Council has what it needs to run effectively and efficiently.

As well as providing high quality services to other areas of the Council, you could also be helping us build on the revenue which comes from our external clients. If you are ambitious, customer-focussed and bursting with new ideas, we want to hear from you.

We recognise and reward you

Hard work and success deserves recognition. That\'s why we pride ourselves on the benefits we give our people. We actively encourage a good work-life balance and promote flexible and agile working arrangements. We provide discounts on various Caf\xc3\xa9s, restaurants, shops and auto enrolment onto our generous Pension Scheme. We also offer a salary sacrifice personal car lease scheme to those who are eligible and have passed their probation period. In addition to the opportunity to gain membership to Costco, we have discounted gym memberships, travel discounts with Arriva and much more.

Buckinghamshire Council