Boost to council services as Hereford gets new, improved info shop

Herefordshire Council is to open its new customer service centre in Hereford on Monday 19 February. The re-designed and refurbished Garrick House premises on the corner of Widemarsh and Blueschool Street will provide a wider range of high quality and responsive public services to local people and will offer longer opening hours, including Saturday mornings.

Visitors to the centre will be able to get information and help from highly-trained customer service professionals on general enquiries, council tax, benefits, planning applications, parking concessions, and business rates, amongst other things. There will be more customer booths, more private interview rooms and more computers for people to access information online. And there will also be improved access for disabled people.

To allow renovations to take place, Garrick House services moved temporarily to nearby Blueschool House on Blueschool Street in September. Those services, together with the customer service staff from the planning service, will move to the new centre on 19 February. Public information about all planning and building control services will move from Blueschool House to the new centre immediately on opening. The cash offices currently based at Hereford Town Hall are also moving to the new centre, where the public will be able to pay their council tax and other council service charges. The facility to pay via direct debit will remain.

The changes are part of a series of improvements to the way Herefordshire Council offers its services to the public. Part of these improvements include the launch of mobile Info Shops later this year, which will make services more accessible to a wider range of citizens. The mobile Info Shops and Info Shops in the market towns will host surgeries where experts will provide advice on subjects such as benefits, building control and planning.

As a further extension of the council’s improved access to its services, from the 14 April, the County Records Office on Harold Street, Hereford will also extend its opening hours to include a full day on the second Saturday of each month.

Councillor June French, who has cabinet responsibility for customer services, said: “This is all part of our commitment to design council services around the needs of local people who tell us they want to be able to speak to the council about a wide range of issues with a single visit or ‘phone call.  And they wanted to be able to contact the council outside of usual working hours too.

“The new centre is designed to make public services as efficient, convenient and as friendly as possible for all members of the community”.

The new centre will provide information and help with over 700 council services, as well as access to many other voluntary and public organisations. Apart from Hereford, there are similar centres in Ross-on-Wye, Swan House, Edde Cross Street (telephone 01432 260500); Leominster, Corn Square (01432 260355); Bromyard, the Bromyard Centre, Cruxwell Street (01432 260280); Ledbury, St Katherines, High Street (01432 261847); and the Kington Centre (01432 260600). The Hereford centre telephone number will be 01432 261563.