Customer Service Officer - Valuation Support Unit - Durham

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This role is part of HMRC Valuation Office, formerly known as the Valuation Office Agency. We have recently integrated into HMRC.

HMRC Valuation Office are the public sectors property valuation experts and advisers with a vision to be a world-leading provider of public sector valuations. Our work is vital to the collection of over 60 billion of revenue which goes back into communities, touching every citizen and every business across England and Wales.

Role Overview

The Valuation Support Unit (VSU) sits at the heart of our operations here in the Valuation Office.

As a Customer Service Officer, you will play a crucial role in supporting our customers to ensure every customer receives a positive experience of the VO. This is a varied and fast paced role, a typical day could involve handling a variety of customer calls, from providing guidance to a small business owner on business rates or responding to a query on Council Tax.

We prioritise speaking to our customers via the telephone. The successful candidates will receive full call handling and technical training to give you the confidence and ability to help our customers. As a Customer Service Officer, you will also have the opportunity to handle customer enquiries via other communication channels and carry out a range of data processing and administrative tasks to support operational functions.

This is a dynamic role where no two days are the same, requiring you to work at pace in a busy environment. While it can be challenging, you will always have colleagues and managers on hand to support you and help you develop valuable experience in problem solving, resilience and customer service skills.

Key responsibilities

• Providing excellent customer service primarily via telephone, and through email and written correspondence.
• Gather information and ensure our customers provide all necessary information correctly.
• Assisting customers with advice based on their query and managing customer expectations through clear communication.
• Providing assistance including explaining procedures or policies, supporting customers to understand our processes and justifying decisions.
• General administration and data processing tasks including using our tools and databases to gather and analyse data.
• Record information on appropriate systems including documenting customer interactions accurately.

We are looking for someone with good communication skills whos passionate about customer service and enjoys the challenge of building relationships with customers.

Quality is central to everything we do here in the VSU and so you should be a performance driven individual motivated to meet targets and deliver against goals. You will be comfortable in dealing sensitively and professionally with people from all walks of life, some of whom may be vulnerable and under stress. To thrive in this role youll be flexible, adaptable and above all willing to work as part of a team to respond to ever-changing priorities at pace, always putting the needs of the customer first.

Essential Requirements

• Customer focussed with a passion for providing high standard and quality service.
• Excellent listening skills with the ability to communicate with different types of people with a range of needs.
• Work at pace, responding flexibly to emerging priorities and able to switch between different types of work as needed.
• Resilient with the ability to manage difficult situations in a calm and professional manner with empathy and compassion.
• Processes and records data safely and securely.
• Goal orientated individual who enjoys working in a target driven environment.
• Good IT skills including keyboard skills and working knowledge of Microsoft Word, Excel, and Outlook.