CalMac first in UK with new customer service award

The UK's largest ferry operator has become the first organisation in the country to be awarded a new level of 'Global Standard' accreditation for the helpfulness and professionalism of its customer operations staff.
 
CalMac's 44 strong Customer Service Team was given the much coveted quality assurance mark by the Contact Centre Association (CCA).

Although accreditation is held by more than 300 private and public sector organisations across the UK, CalMac are the first to pass the new more stringent customer service audit. 

Last year CalMac carried more than 5.3 million passengers and 1.3 million vehicles. Its 33 strong fleet serves 26 routes to island and remote mainland locations. 

The CCA assessor highlighted a number of strengths in the team describing it as a 'competent, well managed, highly customer focused operation.'

Pictures shows: CalMac's Customer Service Team in their operations hub. 

They also praised some key strengths; a continuous focus on the customer experience as well as staff commitment to ongoing improvement as well as an 'impressive' approach to dealing with complaints.

The accreditation involved surveying a range of staff on their customer focused processes to ensure a consistent and professional approach across the centre, and also included closely auditing the the daily workings of the operation. 

Every year staff deal with almost 400,000 phone calls, 37,000 emails covering ferry 
bookings, enquires claims and complaints. 

"Our front line contact centre staff are the face of the organisation, and first impressions last. So, it's vital that what we are saying to customers directly is right first time, every time. I'm delighted that all the hard work our staff have put in to make our contact centre one of the best in the business has been recognised,' said CalMac's Director of Business Development, Karen McGregor. 

'Our staff deal with incredibly complex and challenging situations daily and the CCA accreditation recognises this.'

The CCA also praised the company for its innovative use of social media which has become a mainstream platform for communicating with customers. Social media followers have almost quadrupled over the past five years.