Summary
Dudley Council Plus is Dudley Council’s corporate contact centre. Apprentices gain vast customer contact experience during a placement with us, dealing with a diverse customer base in a demanding first point of contact environment.
Wage
£14,526.20 to £23,492.04, depending on your age
National Minimum Wage
Training course
Customer service specialist (level 3)
Hours
Monday - Friday, 9.00am - 5.00pm.
37 hours a week
Start date
Sunday 1 March 2026
Duration
1 year 3 months
Positions available
1
Work
Most of your apprenticeship is spent working. You’ll learn on the job by getting hands-on experience.
What you'll do at work
* Providing access to some council services
* Receiving and accurately recording enquiries and requests, taking timely and appropriate action in accordance with procedures and instructions
* Escalating any problem cases to experienced customer service advisors and managers
* Working as part of a team supporting service delivery across some directorates of the council
* Communicating and liaising effectively, via the telephone, face-to-face, and in writing with certain customers
* Processing enquiries and requests received via various electronic means
* Using a wide range of computer systems, including a CRM system and MS Office products (especially word and outlook)
* Maintaining computerised records and information systems
* Assisting customers making payments by debit and credit card
* Carrying out reception work including
* Recognising the diverse needs and cultures of the community to ensure equal access to services
* Maintaining an up-to-date knowledge of data protection and freedom of information legislation and guidance, ensuring these principles are adhered to at all times
Where you'll work
Dudley Council Plus
259 Castle Street
Dudley
DY1 1LQ
Training
Apprenticeships include time away from working for specialist training. You’ll study to gain professional knowledge and skills.
Training provider
DUDLEY COLLEGE OF TECHNOLOGY
Training course
Customer service specialist (level 3)
What you'll learn
Course contents
* Business focused service delivery: Demonstrate a continuous improvement and future focussed approach to customer service delivery including decision making and providing recommendations or advice
* Business focused service delivery: Resolve complex issues by being able to choose from and successfully apply a wide range of approaches
* Business focused service delivery: Find solutions that meet your organisations needs as well as the customer requirements
* Providing a positive customer experience: Through advanced questioning, listening and summarising negotiate mutually beneficial outcomes
* Providing a positive customer experience: Manage challenging and complicated situations within your level of authority and make recommendations to enable and deliver change to service or strategy
* Providing a positive customer experience: Use clear explanations, provide options and solutions to influence and help customers make choices and agree next steps
* Providing a positive customer experience: Explore and interpret the customer experience to inform and influence achieving a positive result for customer satisfaction
* Providing a positive customer experience: Demonstrate a cost conscious mind-set when meeting customer and the business needs
* Providing a positive customer experience: Identifying where highs and lows of the customer journey produce a range of emotions in the customer
* Providing a positive customer experience: Use written and verbal communication to simplify and provide complex information in a way that supports positive customer outcome in the relevant format
* Working with customers/customer insights: Proactively gather customer feedback, through a variety of methods. Critically analyse, and evaluate the meaning, implication and facts and act upon it
* Working with customers/customer insights: Analyse your customer types, to identify or anticipate their potential needs and expectations when providing your service
* Customer Service performance: Maintain a positive relationship even when you are unable to deliver the customer’s expected outcome
* Customer Service performance: When managing referrals or escalations take into account historical interactions and challenges to determine next steps
* Service Improvement: Analyse the end to end service experience, seeking input from others where required, supporting development of solutions
* Service Improvement: Make recommendations based on your findings to enable improvement
* Service Improvement: Make recommendations and implement where possible, changes in line with new and relevant legislation, regulations and industry best practice
Training schedule
This training schedule has not been finalised. Check with this employer if you’ll need to travel to a college or training location for this apprenticeship.
Requirements
Essential qualifications
GCSE in:
* 3 other Subjects (grade C or Level 4 Equivalent)
* English (grade C or Level 4 Equivalent)
* Maths (grade C or Level 4 Equivalent)
Share if you have other relevant qualifications and industry experience. The apprenticeship can be adjusted to reflect what you already know.
Skills
* Communication skills
* IT skills
* Attention to detail
* Organisation skills
* Customer care skills
* Problem solving skills
* Presentation skills
* Administrative skills
* Number skills
* Analytical skills
* Logical
* Team working
* Creative
* Initiative
* Non judgemental
* Patience