Courts re-accredited with customer service excellence standard

Scottish Courts & Tribunals Service has been re-accredited for meeting the customer service excellence standard in 2017.

First awarded across the then Scottish Court Service in 2013 (though units within the service were recognised in the preceding two years), this year’s award follows a three year rolling assessment programme.

Assessors reviewed corporate evidence and visited the Sheriff Courts in Ayr, Banff, Dumfries, Falkirk, Glasgow, Jedburgh, Kilmarnock, Peterhead, Selkirk and Stirling; Parliament House in Edinburgh; Operations Development, Operations Delivery and Property Services Unit in SCTS headquarters; and Tribunals Operations Glasgow.

Assessment covered 57 elements, grouped under the headings:

• customer insight
• culture of the organisation
• information and access
• delivery
• timeliness and quality of service.

This year 11 elements were given the highest rating of "compliance plus" (outstanding), unchanged from 2016; 43 were rated "fully compliant" (satisfactory); and only three were rated "partially compliant" (improvement needed), one fewer than in 2016.

Following the 2013 assessment seven elements were rated "partially compliant", and only four were rated "compliance plus".

Congratulating his staff, SCTS chief executive Eric McQueen commented: “This is another fantastic achievement and external validation of the excellent service that you provide. CSE isn’t about the badge; it’s about understanding what works really well and where we can still make improvements. In talking to assessors after their review they wanted to underline to me the passion that you have to provide the best service and the culture of openness and improvement that exists across the whole organisation.”

The most recent SCTS court user satisfaction survey, undertaken in 2015, showed that satisfaction levels remained very high at 89%.