Kingsbury Road is the smallest of Brent’s One Stop Shops; open only three days a week. As the other One Stop Shops within Brent were undergoing refurbishments, to cope with the new inclusion of the revenues and benefits departments, it was also decided to upgrade the system at the smaller Kingsbury Road site.
The Situation
The Kingsbury Road site has used basic manual ticket machine queuing systems since 1992, but as a physically smaller site, and one that sees fewer visitors, then the refurbishment had to remain within budgetary constraints and they kept the previous display panels, which are still in good working order.
Fourteen years later, the Kingsbury Road One Stop Shop had an upgrade to their system, from manual to electronic print-on-demand ticket dispensers. The tickets from these dispensers show the customer how many people are in the queue before them, and the date and time their ticket was printed.
One Stop Shops have traditionally been the first port of call for all general enquiries relating to council services. Employees are able to handle all enquiries, so the use of a basic ticket issuing system had always been sufficient. The general increase of visitors to One Stop Shops means queue length has grown exponentially, and strategies have been developed to manage the bigger queues, and more capable queue management systems employed to reduce confusion.
One Stop Shops have benefited from separating visitors into queues for different services, so that employees with an in depth knowledge of a certain area, like housing or benefits, can use their knowledge to process queries faster. A more advanced queue system means that the employees with the correct skills and knowledge are utilised effectively, for visitors needing specific assistance.
The One Stop Shops need an intelligent queuing system to remove customers’ confusion and speed up the wait. Even at the compact One Stop Shop in Kingsbury Road, the document queues can be reallocated to one desk so that quick document drop-offs can be made.
Why Lonsto?
As mentioned, Kingsbury had an upgrade of existing systems, rather than a brand new installation, like Brent House and the Town Hall. Mrs Pat Openibo, Manager across all of the Brent One Stop Shop sites, states that “Lonsto were helpful and friendly, and much more willing to work within the strict parameters of tight budgets. That means that, as opposed to competitors, Lonsto were much more cost effective, giving options to us within our budget rather than trying to charge consultancy fees.”
“The sales team were very accommodating, and there was a good team effort on the part of Lonsto sales and technical teams. We were able to make considerable savings at the One Stop Shop sites by making use of existing hardware. And even though each One Stop Shop in the borough has a different layout and size, all shops were provided the same high quality service.”
Implementation
Problems were encountered on the installation, as it was discovered that the ceiling of one site could not support the weight of a hanging plasma screen. So changes had to be made when the practicalities of installation proved untenable. The installation was completed as scheduled as part of the general refurbishment during office hours. Installation ran to time in each One Stop Shop, despite having to change the ceiling mounted plasma to a floor standing one. There was also a modification made at one site soon after installation, when a main display was hung too low, and had to be raised for better visibility for customers.
The timely decision was made to refurbish the One Stop Shops, as most were opened in 1980s and looked well-used. The decision to update the queuing systems for all of the One Stop Shops was a major factor in the refurbishment, as the queues were growing and needed managing. Then it was the responsibility of the individual shop managers to liaison with Lonsto around the finer details of the installation, and the details required from the statistics package.
Immediate Benefits
The statistics gathered by the Lonsto Queue Management System provides real time information on queues which is available to managers on their dedicated back office screens. The reports are easy to interpret, and the system enables the management of resources, to manage employees in response to queue fluctuations. An organised queue makes for a calmer atmosphere, and that helps visitors, and employees.
The statistics software is easy to use and interpret, and it manages customer expectations. It is especially useful if one queue becomes heavy, for then it is not difficult to change operations straight away to cope with the demand, and improve employee management. Each manager can see their own One Stop Shop results, and the centralised Performance Indicator and Quality Manager, Jill Taberner, who can see how each One Stop Shop is performing, is then able to create a central report that shows overall performance.
The data is captured from when the button is pressed for a ticket, through to when they are seen, for how long they are seen and what they were seen regarding. The wait before was an average of 73 minutes per customer, and now it is 21 minutes per customer. Lonsto’s software has given Brent council invaluable information on performance indicators to show from the reports the reduction in waiting times.
