Waltham Forest Encourage Residents to Complete Services Online

The London Borough of Waltham Forest implemented online chat software in 2016 into their contact centre. It was originally placed on their contact us page as another method of communication for residents.

This expanded to all main services in an effort to keep visitors on the website in order to complete online processes. As part of their digital transformation, they have managed to encourage residents online and reduce calls.

Waltham Forest is just outside the bottom 10% of the most deprived local authorities, ranking 35th out of 326 in England. Out of 33 London boroughs, the council’s ward currently ranks 7th most deprived. With education also below the England average, many residents may not be confident in their online skills and therefore affects their ability to supply information and complete forms online. Our online chat software enables them to have instant access to support whilst they go through the online processes.

As one of the most diverse boroughs in the country, 48% of Waltham Forest residents are from a minority country, with Urdu, Polish, Romanian, Turkish and Lithuanian being the top five languages spoken locally other than English. Therefore when communicating, text based message can be easier to convey information. A translator can also be used alongside live chat if the resident prefers to chat in their native language.

“All the Functionality We Need in an Online Chat Software”

The council’s project manager who implemented the instant communication channel commented “great product and great support service. We have found working with Click4Assistance a delight. The product has all the functionality we need and it is great value for money. The support we have received from the team has been brilliant and fast.”

Using an online chat software solutions enables agents to handle multiple enquiries at the same time. On average, a trained operator can handle 3 chats at a time, therefore the council have used the max chats functionality to automatically switch advisors to unavailable when they have 3 live chat sessions on the go. Once they have completed a chat, the system changes them back to available. The operator can override this should they need to go unavailable sooner or feel they can take another chat, as it depends on the complexity of the enquiry and how quickly the resident types.

Whilst in chat an agent will be able to see what the visitor is typing in real-time before their message is sent. This provides the advisor with an insight of what the enquiry regards, which helps to speed up their response rate when the message has been sent through as they can begin their answer straight away.

Alternatively, whilst the resident is typing the agent can be responding to other enquiries or looking in the Predefined Reply library for any pre-agreed answer that matches all or some of their question. The selected reply can then be edited to fully answer the visitor’s enquiry.

To help a resident find the area/forms they need on the website, an advisor can easily signpost them in chat by automatically navigating their browser to the relevant webpage. This enables the agent to ensure the visitor is looking at the correct information and encourages self-help once they are in the right place.

A council representative can also ensure that the resident is looking at the right webpage or understand what they are browsing by using Co-Browse which displays a replica page of the one the visitor is viewing. This allows them to advise more accurately.

All these features are included within all of our online chat software packages, they have been developed to help improve response times and save resources allowing fewer members of staff to handle the chat enquiries.

Click4Assistance has been providing live chat for over 15 years, and have helped many councils across the UK to improve their online communications as part of their digital transformation. Why not take a look at the software with a free personalised demonstration? Contact our team on 01268 524628 to find out more.