Trying to contact a bank, energy company, telephone provider or government department can consume much of a morning. The telephone menu offers numerous options, but rarely the one that is needed. Customers listen to music, repeat security information and explain the same problem to several different people. Sometimes the call is disconnected and the whole process must begin again.
Online services are presented as quicker and more efficient. They may be convenient for straightforward transactions, but they become frustrating when something goes wrong. Passwords are forgotten, security codes fail to arrive and automated systems cannot understand an unusual problem. People without smartphones are increasingly excluded.
This is particularly difficult for older and disabled people. Someone with limited mobility may be unable to reach the telephone quickly. A person with poor hearing may struggle with recorded instructions. Others may find small screens, complicated passwords and rapidly changing technology difficult to use.
The customer’s time is treated as though it has no value. A bank may save money by closing branches and reducing staff, but its costs have merely been transferred to its customers. Thousands of people spend millions of hours trying to complete tasks which once required a short conversation across a counter.
Centralisation has separated organisations from the people they serve. Decisions are made in distant offices. Calls are handled by national centres whose staff may know nothing about the customer or the locality. Responsibility is divided between departments, contractors and computer systems. Everyone follows the procedure, but nobody appears able to solve the problem.
Localism could reverse this.
A local bank or service office would not need to reproduce every function of a large organisation. It could provide a real person who could identify the problem, verify the customer and contact the correct department. Several essential services might share the same local office. Banking, energy, water, council services and benefits advice could all be made accessible through a familiar point of contact.
Local staff would gradually get to know the people they served. They would understand that an elderly customer had no smartphone, that another had hearing difficulties, or that someone with limited mobility needed longer to answer the telephone. Such knowledge would reduce repeated explanations and unnecessary security procedures.
Local accountability would also matter. It is much harder to ignore poor service when the organisation is visible within the locality. Customers would know where to go, whom to speak to and how to pursue a complaint. Staff would have names rather than employee numbers.
Not every service can be completely local. Banks will still require national computer systems, specialist departments and regulation. The important change would be to place a human local layer between large systems and the people who depend upon them.
Efficiency should not be measured only by how many branches are closed or how few employees remain. It should include the time, anxiety and inconvenience imposed upon the public. A system which saves an organisation five minutes but wastes an hour of a customer’s time is not efficient. It has simply moved the burden.
Localism would restore something increasingly absent from modern life: the ability to speak to a responsible person who understands the problem and has the authority to help. That would save time, reduce frustration and make essential services more humane.
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