Controller questions if 3-1-1 Center is working
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Controller questions if 3-1-1 Center is working
Catherine Lucey
UPDATED: This post has been updated to include the city's response.
City Controller Alan Butkovitz just released a new report that questions whether the city's 3-1-1 system -- a key program created in Mayor Nutter's first term -- is living up to expectations.
Among the issues raised in the report is that 3-1-1 does not appear to have reduced the call load coming in to the city's 9-1-1 line and that it is difficult to track the vast majority of 3-1-1 calls to see if service is being properly provided.
Check out the report here (which contains the administration's response) and see the Controller's press release below. Scroll down for the city's press release too.
Butkovitz Says 311 System Fails to Meet Key Goals
City Controller’s report finds reduction in non-emergency 911 calls virtually non-existent
PHILADELPHIA – City Controller Alan Butkovitz today released the Report on the Philly 311 System that found the $6 million a year constituent answering service didn’t meet any of the key goals established by the Nutter Administration.
Of the more than 1.3 million calls that came into the 311 System in 2010, only seven percent were monitored. One of the main missions of the 311 System was to monitor all calls received, classify the category of the call and the type of request, and track how much time it took for the request to be addressed and completed.
“There is no excuse for allowing 93 percent of all 311 calls to go unmonitored,” said Butkovitz. “The failure to monitor and code these calls is a direct contradiction of one of the main missions of the 311 System.”
Another core mission of the 311 System was to alleviate non-emergency calls to 911. Responding to the Controller’s Emergency Medical Service (EMS) audit that found EMS units arriving late 40 percent of the time, Mayor Michael Nutter expressed the need for a 311 System to reduce non-emergency calls to 911.
According to Butkovitz, the reduction in non-emergency calls to 911 has been virtually non-existent, if at all.
“One of the goals of any 311 System is to take non-emergency calls away from 911,” said Butkovitz. “In other cities across the country 311 has substantially reduced the number of non-emergency calls to 911, including some cities with double digit reductions.”
Baltimore saw a 50% reduction in non-emergency calls to 911; San Antonio experienced a 20% decrease, while Houston realized a 14% reduction and Denver a 12% reduction.
Other goals of the 311 System that have not been met include the following:
-operators are not available 24 hours per day, seven days a week as promised
-unable to meet its mission to improve city government and the delivery of services
-little effort on the part of the Administration to inform or educate the public about the existence of 311 System.
-no mechanism in place to gauge if citizens are aware of the System’s existence or how many calls coming into City Departments are bypassing the 311 System.
In addition, the Controller’s report found that the 311 System costs taxpayers $6 million a year, not $2.8 million as stated by the Administration.
“Providing accurate financial information and correct statistical data will allow key decision makers in the Administration and City Council to be properly informed about 311’s spending and the success or failure of the system,” said Butkovitz.
“The 311 management and the Administration should use this report and its recommendations as a vehicle to create a formal set of financial and performance guidelines that will accurately monitor the 311 System and help reduce the number of non-emergency calls going to the already overtaxed 911 emergency system.”
UPDATE: City Press Release
MANAGING DIRECTOR’S OFFICE RESPONDS TO CONTROLLER’S REPORT AND RELEASES DATA ON 311 PROGRAM SUCCESS
Philadelphia, October 4, 2011– City of Philadelphia Managing Director Rich Negrin released data that demonstrates that the City’s 311 call system made excellent progress during its first two years in operation.
“Despite the Controller’s assertions, Philly311 is a success,” said Managing Director Negrin. “The data we released today, which we also provided to the Controller, clearly indicates our success.”
The top three reasons for general information calls to Philly311 are for business licensing, court administration, and refuse disposal inquiries. Philly311 also processed over 200,000 city operations service requests primarily for code violation inspections, vacant lot cleanup and missed trash collection.
The 311 program data was released in response to a report by City Controller Alan Butkovitz that asserts that the program is expensive and inefficient. However, according to Negrin, the Controller’s Office did not take into consideration all of the complex customer engagement functions handled within the 311 operations center.
Those functions include back office contact support operations, which processed over 21,000 customer emails and web-self service requests, as well as serving over 30,000 walk-in visitors to the City Hall facility. Also, the Controller incorporated capital and benefit costs into the report, two items not usually included in audits of other city departments, including the Controller’s Office.
Customer satisfaction is the primary measurement of the program’s success and the key factor ignored by the Controller. “To achieve consistently a score in the 90% range in just the second year is outstanding and a true credit to our city employees. We make first-class customer service a priority at Philly311,” said Negrin.
More than 3,000 customer satisfaction surveys show an average customer satisfaction rating of 92 percent. Examples of customer survey testimonials include:
“Every time I've called 311 it's been positive experiences and I like the system”; and “I work at a non-profit law firm and had a question related to a landlord. The 311 Agent went into the L&I system and provided me with all the information I needed. In the past, I used to have to try and track someone down at L&I and wait, wait, wait on hold. Now I can just call 311!”
“The results from the customer satisfaction shows Philly 311 is working for the people who call in,” said Rosetta Carrington Lue, 311 Contact Center Director. “Receiving direct feedback from the citizens we serve keeps us motivated. We are continually improving upon our customer service experience.”
Managing Director Negrin added, “Unlike the Pew case study, the Controller’s program report did not include any of those results in the final report. It clearly missed the whole point of the program.”
Lue also noted that the Controller’s report failed to mention that the 311 Program was designated as a Citizen-Engaged Community winner by the Public Institute of Technology in 2010. The City of Philadelphia was one of only nine cities to receive this designation by creating multi-access channels for residents to contact their local government. “I am very proud that the City of Philadelphia and the staff of Philly311 were applauded for their strong commitment to improve communication with the public,” she said.
The mission of Philly311 is aligned with Mayor Michael A. Nutter’s strategic Goal #5 for the city: Government Being More Efficient, Effective and Responsive. A PhillyStat session will be held on Friday, October 7, 2011 from 11:00am to 12:30pm in Room 1450 at the Municipal Services Building to review the Philly311 operations.
Have we forgotten who sprearheaded this great 3-1-1 idea? That would be the arrogant carpetbagger Camille Cates Barnett. She came to Philadelphia and "worked" for 2 years. Her two main accomplishments were purchasing expensive furniture and having her staff walk her dogs on the clock. She walked away with a $50,000 annual pension when Mayor Nutter is asking for pension changes from District Council 33 and 47. The great reformer Nutter didn't say a word about Barnett leaving city employment with an outrageous pension while at the same time he is asking for pension changes from DC 33 and 47. What did Pete Matthews and Cathy Scott have to say about Barnett and her pension grab? Absolutely nothing. Just like they have said nothing about all of Nutter's high-priced political appointees. Nutter is intellectually dishonest and a hypocrite.
Pete Matthews and Cathy Scott are also in bed with him. Scott and Matthews count their DROP money and collect outrageous salaries while Nutter balances the budget on their workers backs. Both Cathy Scott and Pete Matthews are millionaires with no integrity who have sold out their members by claiming the status quo is the only option.— Serpico- Overall culture of corruption in Philly. Look at the big picture Ben. You are smarter than that. — Serpico
Comment removed.- the 311 System costs taxpayers $6 million a year? Nutter, what the heck is going on?— Tyrone Biggums
- It takes much longer to navigate the City Hall telephone system via the 311 system.— jasper729
- What's your 311? 911!— 24sDad
- Comment removed.
- 311 is a good system... when well-executed. Compare to New York's system which is well advertised on all taxis, well-staffed, available in 10+ languages and 24-7 and oh yeah... capable of routing quickly and providing metrics and you have an amateur job Mr. Nutter.
Hire consultants to clean up 311 and get it seamlessly integrated to all city services quickly and with valid metrics and you have a winner. Advertise it too. It's all in the execution.— phillydutch - Comment removed.
- Without the City Controller's Audit, who would know ???— BobSG
- 311 is a middle man between the public, and the different Departments and Agencies of the City Government!! Before 311, each department and agencies had their own complaint, or information system!!! The problem was employees would only field these calls WHEN THEY FELT LIKE IT!!! If the service was available from 8am-4pm, you can bet no one answered those calls after lunch until closing, so that little window of time in the morning, you could call, and the phone would ring continuously( I timed two dept. it took over a hour and half to answer). This is a joke !!! And so is 311!!!— Dadair1
- It works if you like to talk to IDIOTS to pass time during the day.— mark carr
- I know this system very well. First, Camille Barnett knew nothing about this system and made about 3 appearances during the time it was put in. She couldn't get out of the room fast enough. Second, the phone part of the system that is in place today cost taxpayers nothing. It was through the cleverness of a former deputy commissioner that the system was built as a back up 911 system that cost Philly taxpayers nothing. The problem is that the Call Logging and Statistics system was and still is a piece of junk because the City refused to pay for anything decent. Also, having it overseen by the Managing Director's Office (Nutter's idea) is a waste as most of these guys have no clue. Next, using union labor as call takers just made it version 2 of the old City Hall Operator's Dept. The whole notion of saving money at 911 was silly. It is a better system than the old City Hall operator's, but it was never close to being funded to the level these centers have to be to be successful and the managers of it are incompetent. Also, the real savings would come if the somehow put a IVR (Interactive Voice Response) system in the mix that would handle a lot of these calls and transfers without human intervention. Of course, there are 2 issues involved - you can't put an IVR in front of a 911 system because 911 demands immediate call answering and you actually have to spend money to put the components in place that would make this efficent. Your local phone company has solutions, but you have to spend money to make it work right (reporting, management statistics, IVR and texting). Otherwise, it is just an average to below average solution. Also, what makes anyone think these department managers want to have to answer to these statistics? Taking ownership obligates them to solve the problem and the city is too broke to fix many things.— martycon
- This article lacks important details. What does "monitored" mean? Some supervisor listens to the call? Someone calls the caller back later to see if the problem was resolved? I'd be shocked if any company monitors 100% of its calls in any meaningful sense, so what is a reasonable monitoring rate? Also, how many and what kinds of non-911 calls is 911 still getting? The controller says 911 calls haven't declined, but Philadelphia is a violent city -- how many of those 911 calls are real emergencies? Finally, all the people who said that 311 here was under-funded and under-advertised -- darn right. Also, I'd like to know if the controller himself is planning to run for office.— AmandaWBS
311 worked for me , but not for some of my friends. The program needs re-working.— Ben Fan- It's about time that someone pointed out what Nutter and his team wanted hidden, that they put in a cheap system to meet their own artificial deadline and claim a win on at least one of his campaign promises. Now we pay every year for a half-*ssed system that Nutter and his little kiss-ups have been bragging about for three years even though it doesn't meet its primary objective - entering a service request that can be tracked by the citizen from beginning to end and measured for whether the outcome matched program goals. It doesn't even matter because he'll perform Rapper's Delight 10 more times this year and get re-elected by the yuppies who think he's all that.— bullrun
- The problem arises from nit wits calling 911 for a toe nail clipping. Throw these idiots in the jail house and the phoney 911 calls will stop. That is what we do in this country today. Instead of fixing the real problem we create a new one to fix the old one. 311 can't fix the abuse of 911. Maybe if we rounded up all these boneheads calling 911 for ketchup for their fries and caned them bloody this foolishness would stop.— ephraim
- Man, Buckovitz does some really bad reports. He starts with a conclusion, then utilizes a set of methods to reach said conclusion.— bobcitydoc
- The 6 Million dollars wasted could have went to the non-represented staff members who work harder with less. This is crazy. When can we get a break. I am tired of watching city waste money on these crazy ideas and watching my paycheck shrink.— Nancy88
- The audit process is very disappointing. It's great to have an office dedicated to ensuring proper use of taxpayer funds. However, when that Department contracts with an outside agency that is inexperienced and even incapable, we wonder if the Controller's office itself is wasting money procucing inacurate and imcomplete information. It is quite discouraging to me, at least.— EAvila
- Comment removed.
- I've heard that the City Controller outsourced the 311 audit to a private consultant with no call center experience. How much did that cost the residents of Philadelphia? If experience in the industry wasn't required, why couldn't this audit be completed by his staff to save the taxpayers money?— Jerry Burns
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David Gambacorta spent a small eternity writing about cops, drug dealers and serial killers. Now he’s writing about power and politics – which sometimes reminds him of the old crime beat. He joined the Daily News in 2005. And yes, he knows you’re not quite sure how to pronounce his last name. E-mail tips to gambacd@phillynews.com
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Jan Ransom, a native New Yorker, joined the Daily News in 2010 after graduating from Howard University. She has since written about the difficulty of filing police complaints, tax deadbeats and life after violent home invasions. She joined the Daily News City Hall Bureau in 2011 and has plunged headfirst into reporting on administration budget battles and City Council shenanigans. E-mail tips to ransomj@phillynews.com
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Sean Collins Walsh is from Bucks County and went to Northwestern University. He joined the Daily News copy desk in 2012 and now covers the Nutter administration. Before that, he interned at papers including The New York Times, The Dallas Morning News and The Seattle Times. E-mail tips to walshSE@phillynews.com
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