Gatwick teams qualified in customer service excellence
Gatwick staff obtain award for 'Delivering Excellent Customer Service'
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Kayte Platts Wednesday 11 May 2011 |
Half of Gatwick Airport's 1,500 front-line staff have achieved a City & Guild Level 2 Award in 'Delivering Excellent Customer Service'. The remaining 750 staff will complete their training by October this year, helping to put Gatwick at the top of the league when it comes to customer service.
Tourism South East Training and Skills has worked closely with Gatwick to design a tailored training programme to help staff understand how they can do their bit to drive improvements in customer-service for the 32 million passengers who travel through the airport each year.
Stewart Wingate, CEO of Gatwick Airport, said: "Our priority under new ownership is to deliver the best end-to-end passenger experience through the airport and make Gatwick London's airport of choice. Passengers will judge their experience of Gatwick not just on the quality of the airport facilities but also on the friendliness and helpfulness of our staff. That is why we are investing in the training and development of our people at the same time as we invest to improve the physical environment of the airport.
"And I am delighted that, half way through the training programme, we are already seeing positive results with passenger compliments up by 94% and complaints down by 15% in 2010 compared to 2009. We also seem to be employing the brainy bunch with a pass rate of 98% compared to the national average of 78%."
Commenting on the success of the programme, John Williams, Chairman of Tourism South East said: "We are delighted with the results achieved at Gatwick Airport. The airport will have a key role to play in welcoming people from all over the world when they come to attend the Olympic and Paralympic Games next year and this programme will have a positive impact."
The training forms part of Tourism South East's 'Welcome Host Gold Programme' - a programme launched to improve the levels of customer services across the South East and funded by the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA). It is established as one of the leading customer service training courses in the UK, designed for staff in tourism, hospitality, leisure, transport and travel businesses.
It is promising to see the scheme that has been implemented is having a positive response from passengers passing through this busy airport, and thus making their journeys more pleasurable as a result.
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Jackie Pulman 15 May 2011, 01:29PM | |
You do get to thinking that things never change but Gatwick deserve a lot of credit for trying to improve their performance and image. OK, so the airport is still like a building site and its impossible to park etc etc, but slowly the feel of the place is improving. | |
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Colin Knight 17 May 2011, 09:38PM | |
I use Gatwick and my brother uses Heathrow and I always reckon that Gatwick is better. The nice thing is that it is getting even better. | |
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My wife works out of Gatwick and she says that the improvements in the last year have been really noticeable. | |
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Kim Greatwood 19 May 2011, 02:12PM | |
Gatwick's new owners are doing a good job. It shows what a bit of shaking up can do. | |
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Gregory, Sussex 1 August 2011, 02:18PM | |
It is good to see that Gatwick's owners are actually trying to improve things such as customer service. All to often buildings have a make over and nothing else changes. Credit were credit is due, well done. | |
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