COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

South Dublin County Council Crest

MEETING OF SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

Monday, July 14, 2014

QUESTION NO.41

QUESTION: Councillor G. O'Connell

To ask the Chief Executive  for a report on the operation of “Fixyourstreet” and to include in the report what percentage of complaints are subsequently dealt with and what the time lag is between an individual logging a complaint and an update being given/available to the person?

REPLY:

Launched by South Dublin County Council in August 2011, the Fix Your Street online service was rolled out to all local authorities nationally during 2012. South Dublin County Council was the lead authority in this process and by 2013 the service was fully operational in every council.

There has been a good take up of the service by the public and a total of 9,791 reports were received in 2013.The most recent comprehensive breakdown of 'Fix your Street' data is available for year end 2013. As can be seen from the table below, Litter and Illegal Dumping was the most reported category nationally at 45% of the reports with Road or Path Defects in second place at 24%.

Fix Your Street 2013
Category   Percentage of Total Reports
Graffiti 336  3.43%
Leaks and Drainage 408  4.17%
Litter and Illegal Dumping 4473  45.68%
Road or path defects 2356  24.06%
Street Lighting 1448  14.79%
Tree and Grass Maintenance 770  7.86%
TOTAL  9791  100%
     

Of the 9791 reports received in 2013, South Dublin County Council received 2843 reports, by far the largest number, most probably owing to the lead role we have played in its promotion and development. The average response time for South Dublin was 1.68 days in 2013 which is in compliance with the 48 hour response commitment in the Programme for Government.

In 2014, at the time of writing this reply, over the previous 30 days there have been 349 reports to the site for South Dublin County of which 337 have been answered, 12 are currently unanswered. Of the 337 which were acknowledged, the average response rate was .76 of a working day. Of the 12 currently unanswered, 5 are over the 2 day response limit.

The commitment that "the response available through the website will always be given by an official of the relevant council" is adhered to by every local authority. Due to the scheduling of works programmes, the work required may be carried out at a later date. In these cases a commitment date is recorded on the system and a further update will issue on or before that date advising of the scheduling of the work programme. For example, a member of the public can log a report for tree pruning and they will receive an acknowledgement within the 2 day framework; however the work may be added to a future works programme for completion at a later date, which in the instance of tree pruning can in general only take place at certain times of the year. These requests received through 'Fix Your Street 'are then captured with a commitment and tracked within the Council's Customer Care System. The Customer Care System shows that there were 1,945 Fix Your Street entries for the period from the 1st January 2014 to the 30th June 2014.

The site is in 'beta', which means it is under continual improvement and development. In May 2014 a new email facility was added to the site whereby notifications are now issued to those customers who submit an email address. These notifications issue each time there is an update to the reports.