Customer Service Apprentice

Summary

An excellent opportunity for someone who is seeking a career in Administration and/or Education. We are committed to providing an apprenticeship opportunity that will allow you to experience a wide range of skills and situations to give you the best possible start to your career.

Annual wage: £12,314 a year
Minimum wage rates (opens in new tab)
Training course: Customer service specialist (level 3)
Hours: Monday - Friday, between 8:30am and 5pm
37 hours a week
Possible start date: Friday 28 February
Duration: 1 year
Positions available: 1

Work

As an apprentice, you’ll work at a company and get hands-on experience. You’ll gain new skills and work alongside experienced staff.

What you’ll do at work

We are looking for an organised individual with a flexible approach to work, a willingness to learn and develop, with the ability to work at times without supervision. You should have strong numeracy skills, together with excellent customer service skills.

Working as a member of the Reception Team, the main purpose of the role will be:

To be the first point of contact for all visitors to the College.
To work as a member of the Reception Team and to assist in providing prospective students with the most appropriate information.
To undertake Reception duties, taking and receiving phone calls, provide clerical support including data input, cash handling and dealing with mail and parcels.
Ensure that visitors receive a professional and efficient welcome on behalf of the College. This is to include registration and identification. Liaise with staff regarding appointments, interviews, car parking and other general office duties.
Deal with initial enquiries including email enquiries regarding courses.
Provide information on college facilities, courses, and events, taking enquiries and disseminating information to the relevant staff.
Operate the College telephone, fax and radio paging system and be first point of contact for Fire and emergency systems liaising with other College staff as per college procedures.
Process incoming/outgoing deliveries including parcels and recording details in an efficient manner. Frank outgoing mail and distribution of internal mail.
Computer input using College software systems such as Net2 and sims. Will also use Outlook, Word, and Excel.
Work flexibly as a member of the Customer Service team across all our sites in Bury St Edmunds to include working flexible hours and providing cover for shifts where necessary. Ensure there is effective communication throughout the team, ensuring all team members are kept up to date with current activity.
Participate in events across the College, e.g. open events, student interviews, enrolment etc.
Ensure publicity materials are displayed and stocks maintained for collection by enquirers. To assist in maintaining the Course Information Sheets ensuring that only accurate information is available for enquirers either by paper or on the College website.
Adhere to all College policies including the current data protection act and computer misuse act, treating all data as confidential.
Adhere to the Risk Management Policy and notify the Vice Principal for Quality and Student Experience and Head of Pastoral Support of any identified risk.
The above job description is not exhaustive, and the employee may be required to undertake any other reasonable duties in line with the general level of responsibility of the role.
As we now operate as a collective Eastern Education Group you may be from time to time required to undertake any of the requirements of your role for any of our Group organisations.

This role will be based at our Abbeygate Sixth Form College site in Bury St Edmunds, however there will be the requirement to work across our wider campuses on occasion as required.

Where you’ll work

Abbeygate Sixth Form, Beetons Way

Bury St. Edmunds

IP33 3YU

Training

An apprenticeship includes regular training with a college or other training organisation. At least 20% of your working hours will be spent training or studying.

College or training organisation

WEST SUFFOLK COLLEGE

Your training course

Customer service specialist (level 3)

Equal to A level

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

Your training plan

The learner will be studying the Customer Service Specialist Level 3 Apprenticeship Standard qualification.
Functional skills will be studied if equivalent qualifications are not held.

Requirements

Desirable qualifications

GCSE or equivalent in:

5 subjects, including Maths and English (grade 4)

Let the company know about other relevant qualifications and industry experience you have. They can adjust the apprenticeship to reflect what you already know.

Skills

Communication skills
IT skills
Attention to detail
Organisation skills
Customer care skills
Administrative skills
Team working
Initiative

Other requirements

1. New support staff appointments to the Trust are subject to a 26-week probationary period. 3. The Trust is committed to safeguarding & promoting the welfare of young people/vulnerable adults and expects all staff to share this commitment. 4. The job description is current at the date shown; may change in negotiation with the post holder.

About this company

Abbeygate Sixth Form College is part of the Suffolk Academies Trust, working closely with One Sixth Form College and West Suffolk College. Abbeygate opened in 2019, with a Year 12 cohort only; in September 2020 we moved into our brand new state of the art building, accommodating both Year 12 and 13. We offer a broad and balanced A Level curriculum, with a wide range of activities and opportunities to enrich and extend students’ experience to develop well-rounded individuals with the essential skills required for their future studies and careers.

After this apprenticeship

At the end of your studies, you will have to opportunity to apply for any suitable vacancies within the organisation. Previous candidates in post have since been promoted internally and we would be delighted to offer the same such opportunities to our next apprentice.

Ask a question

The contact for this apprenticeship is: