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This case study highlights how Lagan 311 solutions have enabled San Francisco to deliver high quality customer services to its citizens while at the same time delivering ROI within 7 months.

On March 29, 2007, the City and County of San Francisco unveiled its new 311 Customer Service Center. With 44 customer service representatives (CSRs) available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, the state-of-the-art center was designed to make it easier for residents to navigate the maze of over 2,300 telephone numbers that existed previously to access city services.

Additionally, by offering residents a 311 number, the City expected to relieve call volumes in its 911 center, where over 50% of calls received were for non-emergency services. The center was also equipped with a Language Line service, providing the ability to serve customers in over 145 languages, an important feature given the diversity of San Francisco’s residents, 45% of whom speak a language other than English at home.

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Mayor Gavin Newsom, who initially proposed the service as a Supervisor in 1999 and called for the center’s creation in his 2004 State of the City address, at the time of the launch said, “San Francisco residents, businesses, and visitors have a right to the best possible customer service from their City. 311 is a powerful tool for holding government accountable to the people we serve, while making life a lot easier for every resident.”

The City selected the Lagan 311 solution as the foundation for its customer service center based on the following:
? scalability to expand to support additional services over time
? a flexible knowledge base so that CSRs could provide consistent and accurate answers
? the ability to track service requests and monitor response times

“Officials from other cities often ask me, ‘is it worthwhile in these challenging economic times to worry about customer service?’ My answer is a resounding ‘yes’. Every wrong number is a call that at some point has to be answered and a customer that is becoming increasingly frustrated. A 311 call center not only saves time for the customer but also saves time for the city which, in turn, saves money,” stated Andy Maimoni, Deputy Director, San Francisco 311.

San Francisco’s one-stop customer service center quickly became an invaluable part of city life for residents, with calls reaching 2 million after the first year and escalating to 3 million after the first 15 months. As of March 2009, the call center had answered 5.5 million calls, had a monthly volume of approximately 350,000 calls and served callers in more than 175 languages. Supporting the City’s increasingly popular call center are 76 full-time CSRs, 10 part-time CSRs, 7 supervisors and 13 other executives, trainers, business and quality assurance analysts, and IT administrators.As administrators looked for ways to maintain service quality while meeting rising demand within budget, another capability of the Lagan 311 solution captured their attention–self service capabilities via the web.

Read more on the San Francisco experience here: