Apprentice (Customer Advisor Advanced)

Summary

Do you want to be part of building a greener, healthier, and stronger North West? Come and join us! With a range of award-winning roles on offer, you’re sure to find your perfect career here at United Utilities. We’ll provide you with industry-leading skills and the experience you need to succeed in your chosen field.

Annual wage

£19,000 a year

Minimum wage rates (opens in new tab)

Annual increase

Training course

Customer service practitioner (level 2)

Hours

Monday - Friday, shifts TBC.

37 hours a week

Possible start date

Wednesday 3 September

Duration

1 year 6 months

Positions available

6

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

As an Apprentice Customer Advisor Advanced, you’ll learn how to:

Provide excellent customer service to our customers, including diagnosing and resolving customer issues to their total satisfaction
Deal with customer queries quickly and efficiently through to resolution
Escalate cases for support as required
Ensure systems notes and records are updated in line with regulatory requirements

A bit more about the role:

Your apprenticeship will last 18 months, and successful apprentices will achieve a Customer Service Practitioner, Level: 2, endorsed by the Institute for Apprenticeships. Completion of this apprenticeship will lead to eligibility to join the Institute of Customer Service as an Individual member at Professional level.

The work you do is vital for our business. You'll be dealing with customers queries quickly, efficiently and through to resolution ensuring that they are completely satisfied with how we have dealt with their query. You'll also be involved in:

Speaking with and helping our customers with their queries or problems
Accurately recording and processing a variety of customer enquires
Diagnosing customer issues and investigating and interpreting data held on several different systems
Managing customer expectations as well as setting and agreeing timescales for actions to be performed
Promoting United Utilities products and services
Gain and insight into various departments and teams within our customer service tea

Where you’ll work

Sir Christopher Harding House

North Shore

Whitehaven

CA28 7XY

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

REALISE LEARNING AND EMPLOYMENT LIMITED

Your training course

Customer service practitioner (level 2)

Equal to GCSE

Course contents

Use a range of questioning skills, including listening and responding in a way that builds rapport, determines customer needs and expectations and achieves positive engagement and delivery.
Depending on your job role and work environment: Use appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication skills, along with summarising language during face-to-face communications; and/or
Depending on your job role and work environment: Use appropriate communication skills, along with reinforcement techniques (to confirm understanding) during non-facing customer interactions.
Depending on your job role and work environment: Use an appropriate ‘tone of voice’ in all communications, including written and digital, that reflect the organisation’s brand.
Provide clear explanations and offer options in order to help customers make choices that are mutually beneficial to both the customer and your organisation.
Be able to organise yourself, prioritise your own workload/activity and work to meet deadlines.
Demonstrate patience and calmness.
Show you understand the customer’s point of view.
Use appropriate sign-posting or resolution to meet your customers needs and manage expectations.
Maintain informative communication during service recovery.

Your training plan

You’ll need to have:

2 GCSEs or equivalent, grades A-C or grades 9-4 in Maths and English

During your apprenticeship, you may need to travel to your place of study. If you’re from outside the area, accommodation will be provided by United Utilities during this period (excluding weekends). Please consider travel requirements and staying away from home if applicable.

*As long as you meet all necessary standards and behaviour criteria throughout the programme.

We need fantastic people to help us deliver a great service to the public. We are committed to reaching and recruiting from every community, supporting our employees to achieve their full potential, and ensuring everyone feels valued and included, regardless of gender, age, race, disability, sexual orientation, or social background.

More training information

If you are offered a job with us, a number of pre-employment checks will need to be carried out before your appointment can be confirmed. Any offer of employment with United Utilities will be subject to a satisfactory report from the Disclosure Scotland/ the Disclosure and Barring Service.

Please only apply for one apprenticeship; as part of the assessment process you will be asked to detail why you have applied for the apprenticeship vacancy.

Please note that we are unable to offer Visa sponsorship for this role.

Requirements

Essential qualifications

GCSE or equivalent in:

Maths, English (grade 2 GCSEs, grades A-C or 9-4)

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
Problem solving skills
Number skills
Logical
Team working
Initiative
Non judgemental
Patience

Other requirements

Some working outdoors, and heavy lifting.

About this company

United Utilities is responsible for water and wastewater services in the North West of England. Our purpose is to provide great water and more for the North West. We deliver 1.8 billion litres of water a day to more than 3 million homes and businesses in the North West, as well as treating all the wastewater which disappears around the U-bend. Keeping the region flowing relies on a vast behind the scenes operation, involving hundreds of reservoirs, treatment works and pumping stations; thousands of kilometres of water pipes and sewers and a 5,000 strong workforce.

https://www.unitedutilities.com (opens in new tab)

Disability Confident

A fair proportion of interviews for this apprenticeship will be offered to applicants with a disability or long-term health condition. This includes non-visible disabilities and conditions.

You can choose to be considered for an interview under the Disability Confident scheme. You’ll need to meet the essential requirements to be considered for an interview.

After this apprenticeship

Electrical Field Service Engineer

Ask a question

The contact for this apprenticeship is:

REALISE LEARNING AND EMPLOYMENT LIMITED

UUEarlyCareers@uuplc.co.uk

03301754408

The reference code for this apprenticeship is VAC1000297646.

Apply now

Closes in 28 days (Wednesday 19 February)

When you apply, you’ll be asked to sign in with a GOV.UK One Login. You can create one at the same time as applying for this apprenticeship.

After signing in, you’ll apply for this apprenticeship on the company's website.

Cookies on Find an apprenticeship

Contents