Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council

Service Standards

At all times we will

• Deal with you in a polite and helpful way.
• Listen to you and take account of your views.
• If we cannot help you directly we will put you in touch with someone who can.

Visiting our reception;

• Our reception is open Monday to Thursday 8.30am to 5.00pm, and 8.30am to 4.30pm Friday.
• You will usually be seen within 15 minutes, but often sooner.
• You can discuss your enquiry in a private interview room.
• We will keep our reception areas clean and tidy.
• We will do as much as we can to make our reception areas physically accessible.
• We will provide a translator if you need one.

Telephoning Us;

• You can call us 8.00am to 6.00pm Monday to Thursday, 8.00am to 5.30pm Friday and 10.00am to 1.00pm Saturday.
• Outside these hours you can leave a message on our answerphone.
• We will aim to answer your call in 5 rings.
• If we cannot deal with your enquiry at the time of your call we will call you back the next working day.

Emailing Us;

• We will acknowledge your email within 1 day and respond in full within 10 working days.

Writing to Us;

• We will acknowledge letters within 5 days and respond in full within 10 working days.

Visiting you;

• We have a dedicated visit line. You can call our visitline on 526674. This service will allow you to re-arrange appointments at your convenience.
• Our Visitors will show you their identification cards when they arrive.
• We can set up passwords for security if you prefer.

About your claim

• We will process your claim within 14 days of receiving all the information we need.
• On average we will process your claim within 29 days of receiving your claim form.
• We will process all change of circumstances within 9 days of receiving the change.
• We will send your appeals to the Tribunals Service within 3 calender months.
• We will pay your Housing Benefit within 7 days of a successful decision being made on your claim.

Complaints

• We will acknowledge your complaint within 5 working days and respond within 10 working days
• We will investigate your complaint fully.
• We will consider your complaint to see how we can improve our service so the same complaint does not arise again.