Customer service skills initiative launched for Bury St Edmunds
An initiative aimed at making Bury St Edmunds a centre of excellence for customer service has been launched by the Business Improvement District (BID). Businesses who are members of Our Bury St Edmunds BID will be offered free training opportunities and partner organisations with volunteers or staff who engage with members of the public will also be able to participate.
The idea grew from an inclusivity conference held at St Edmundsbury Cathedral last autumn. It had looked specifically at improving accessibility in the town centre by making positive changes to ensure people with different needs including disabilities, dementia and neurodiversity would always feel welcome.
It inspired Our Bury St Edmunds BID Chief Executive Mark Cordell to look at a wider opportunity for the town centre. He said: “I know that standards of customer service are generally high in the town, but I think they could become exceptional whether they are the big High Street names or the independents who make up almost 60% of the town centre. Offering this training – which is open to all but often especially welcomed by those who don’t have head offices with in-house training courses, seemed a natural progression to aim to make the town centre one of the best for customer service that it can be.
“I started looking at ways that this can be recognised, including discussions with WorldHost who have been involved with customer service skills provision at major events including The Rugby World Cup and The Open. We’re now in a position to offer free training to staff from our member businesses and some of our partner organisations.”
The training opportunities will be open to BID member businesses as well as groups that have volunteers who interact with the public including Bury St Edmunds Tour Guides, St Edmundsbury Cathedral and Bury St Edmunds Rickshaw. West Suffolk Council staff who are based in the town centre will also be eligible.
Our Bury St Edmunds BID is working with Eastern Education Group at West Suffolk College who will provide the customer service training. Joe Sadler, Employer Engagement Lead with the Group commented: “Good customer service has never been more important to help businesses stand out and I very much welcome this initiative from the BID. Eastern Education Group is delighted to partner with the BID to offer this training and the fact that there has been so much interest already is very encouraging.”
Our Bury St Edmunds has, for some years, sponsored the Customer Service Award at the Bury Free Press Business Awards. Mark Cordell added: “Being involved with this award in recent years I’ve seen businesses large and small from the hospitality sector to solicitors and travel agents being recognised and I know that customer service is very important to our businesses. We are already the foodie capital of Suffolk and winner of the country’s most dog-friendly town award, it would be wonderful to be acknowledged as having the best customer service too.”
The training courses start in September and will be offered in person and online. Once the initiative is fully underway, one of the ways of monitoring it’s success will be by ‘mystery shoppers.’
