Customer Management Approach (CMA) for Child Support 277-01100000

Customer management is all about the customer

Child Support is required to work with customers in a way that resolves presenting issues and ensures the right amount of child support is paid in full and on time. The approach is clearly focused on the customer experience and their journey through Child Support. It is about achieving better customer outcomes and improving the collection of child support, no matter what part of the business a Service Officer is in.

The service in Child Support is collection

The CMA helps Service Officers bring to life the goal of making 'collection is everyone's responsibility.' A nationally consistent approach ensures collection is a core part of all of Child Support's interactions with customers.

This section outlines the principles and features that guide Child Support's approach to managing all customer interactions. The steps in the instructions are aligned to these principles.

This information below describes the 4 key principles that underpin the Customer Management Approach. Each of these principles drives Child Support's approach with customers, so that the service Child Support provides supports quality customer outcomes.

1. Collection focus

All areas working towards achieving payment and collection outcomes, ensuring that collection is everyone's responsibility.

2. Customers

Maximising customer interactions by:

• aiming to resolve the customer enquiry at the point of entry
• addressing all outstanding issues
• interacting in a manner that suits the customer's needs, providing easy access and utilising available channels, and
• appropriately connecting customers to more specialised areas, or external referrals for assistance. See Service referrals for Child Support customers

3. Quality

Taking responsibility for delivering quality outcomes, working with parents and explaining decisions to get it right the first time.

4. People

Making sure the process supports staff by reducing duplication, being simple, easy to use, well implemented and well supported

The information below describes the 5 key features of the CMA.

1. Collection is everyone's responsibility

Child Support's core service is collection. In all interactions with parents, Child Support shows that it cares about collection by working to ensure that child support is paid in full and on time. Wherever possible, payment, care, and incomes will be addressed up front and during every customer interaction.

Different parts of the business have different roles in collecting child support. However, staff in all business areas will undertake at least Minimum Collection Activity.

Minimum Collection Activity will generally be achieved at the point of customer contact or through simple follow-up action. More complex follow-up or collection action will be undertaken by the appropriate business area.

2. A consistent approach to locking and unlocking

Locking and unlocking is based on achieving key outcomes that will help improve the customer experience in line with Child Support's customer management principles. These are:

• to deliver customers to the right business line so that anyone in that area can assist
• to clearly identify who is responsible for any outbound work or follow-up action, and
• to ensure the Service Officer verbally explains decisions before finalising

Service Officers should make every effort to contact customers verbally to explain decisions, as per Contact with Child Support Customers.

Verbally explaining decisions gives customers an opportunity to raise issues, identify opportunities to offer external referrals and helps them to understand reasons for the decisions made. Where a Service Officer is unable to make contact, auto-unlocking allows customers to contact Child Support after receiving written advice and to have their call answered by the appropriate area.

3. Common and specialised work activities

It is important that Child Support maximises the customer experience by addressing all customer issues at the point of entry wherever possible. This provides a holistic service, reduces duplication and minimises customer transfers between business areas.

To do this the department provides a core service offer through a set of 'common' work activities. These are completed by all staff, with more specialised activities undertaken by the appropriate specialist areas.

See Common and specialised activities for Child Support staff for more details.

4. Managing multiple issues - a collaborative approach

Sometimes customers present with multiple issues. It's important that Child Support manages these in a way that is easy for customers and connects them to specialist assistance, or external referrals where required. The approach varies depending on the combination of common and specialised activities.

Often customers will present with both child support and non-child support related issues. It is important that Child Support manages the child support issues and also provides external referrals to connect customers with available help from other organisations.

5. Working with payees to improve collection outcomes

Collection is Child Support's core service and the Service Officer needs to work with both parents to improve collection outcomes. Payees can be a valuable source of collection information and should be kept informed of the action taken.

Gathering collection information from payees is a critical step in determining if new collection information is available.

If there is no new collection information, Child Support needs to explain this to payees and tell them any new collection information that becomes available will be followed up.