Brisbane City Council (Herein Council) is Australia’s largest local government in both population and budget. Their responsibility is to provide leadership and good governance for the people of Brisbane and to manage their resources to create a prosperous and vibrant new world city. Guiding this is the Brisbane Vision 2031, Council’s long-term community plan for the city. It details aspirations for the city’s future and ideas for achieving these aspirations. Complementing the Brisbane Vision is Council’s Customer Focus Vision for an organisation that is dedicated to customers, everyone, everywhere, every time. It aims to ensure customers’ needs are considered in everything they do.

Council serves Brisbane communities through its contact centre and business hotline, whose consultants provide resident and business customers with 24/7 access to Council information, services and support. The business hotline transforms the way Council serves Brisbane businesses. It minimises response times and ensures high-level client management for business customers. It also provides opportunities to capture data and intelligence about Brisbane businesses. This research guides further investment in training and support for Council employees dealing with business customers, enabling them to provide ‘whole-of-process’ status updates on customer applications and more certainty around assessment processes, approval and timeframes.

In addition, Council has five business centres across the city with staff providing information and professional advice on topics including licensing, permits, local laws and animal registration. Council continues to measure business customer satisfaction through its Customer Satisfaction and Service Tracker surveys and annual market research, with insights driving the ongoing innovation of Council products and services.

Brisbane City Council is now being recognised for a Service Excellence Award in the Australian Business Awards 2016.