Charter Mark

Tameside MBC has become the first metropolitan borough council to gain the prestigious Charter Mark for all of its services.

Charter Mark focuses attention on one of the most important aspects of our day-to-day business: our residents. It provides us with a set of standards that we can use to measure ourselves against, and the blue print for improvement.

The standards are:

• Criterion 1: Set standards and perform well
• Criterion 2: Actively engage with your customers, partners and staff
• Criterion 3: Be fair and accessible to everyone and promote choice
• Criterion 4: Continuously develop and improve
• Criterion 5: Use your resources effectively and imaginatively
• Criterion 6: Contribute to improving opportunities and quality of life in the communities you serve

Each service within Tameside submitted documents and provided evidence to show how they met the Charter Mark standard, alongside a number of corporate documents such as the Community Strategy. A Charter Mark inspector then visited the council for one week, speaking to staff, residents and partners such as the police.

Following this inspection it was confirmed that Tameside MBC had achieved the Charter Mark standard with a record 100% compliance. The inspector commented that:

"The Council demonstrates an outstanding commitment to excellent customer service. Staff work well with customers, officers of other local authorities, colleagues within other parts of services, agencies and other partners. All parties are kept informed and involved. There were indications of very high levels of customer satisfaction"

Despite this success, we know there are further improvements we can make. The Charter Mark standard itself is being revised, challenging us once again to show we are delivering the best customer service possible to the residents of Tameside.

Emma Peake, who heads the Charter Mark team within the Cabinet Office, said:

'Charter Mark drives improvement within organisations and focuses attention on customer needs. The new standard will build on this legacy, challenging organisations to better understand their customers and meet their rising expectations of public service delivery.'

For more information about the Charter Mark scheme, see www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/chartermark