Customer Care
How to get in touch
Report a problem via the website
You can easily report issues to us via our Report a Problem page.
Give us a call
If you have an emergency or want to speak to us, you can call us on 0345 60 80 193. For Text Relay call us on 18001 0345 60 80 193.
Freedom of Information Requests
We aim to make as much information available on our website as possible and our Highways Customer Team are available to answer questions. You can also find FOI responses that has already been published in the East Sussex County Council (ESCC) disclosure log.
You can find copies of our Highways policies on the ESCC Website:
• Highway Policies Strategies and Plans
• Network Management and Improvement
• Emergencies and Network Resilience
You can find out about how often we inspect the highway, when we will carry out repairs and how long this will take in our Highway Asset Inspection Guidance Document.
To make a request please visit the East Sussex County Council website to find out how to submit a Freedom of Information or Environmental Information Regulations request.
Facts and Figures
We also have general facts and figures on the service we provide alongside reporting on the number of potholes reported within your local authority.
Compliments and Complaints
Our Standards
Our Customer Care Standard sets out the level of service which you can expect from us.
Using our website or email, you can expect an acknowledgement to be sent in 1 working day and a reply within 10 working days. If we can’t resolve your query within that time frame, we will advise on what action we will take next.
If you phone us we will answer the phone promptly, it may take us longer to answer in busy periods but where possible we will tell you the wait time.
When we receive a letter from you, we will reply with 10 working days. If we can’t resolve everything we will write to let you know we have received your letter and let you know what we will do next and when you can expect a full reply.
We monitor our performance against our standards and publicise the results of this weekly in our Customer Performance Dashboard.
Your Feedback
Within East Sussex Highways your views are important to us and we want to hear what you think about the services we deliver.
Your feedback helps us to ensure we provide you with the best service possible when you let us know:
• When we are doing something right.
• If something has gone wrong and you are not happy with the service you received from us.
Customer feedback helps us do this for you. If we know when something has gone wrong we can work to improve the services that we provide for you.
You Said, We Did
| You Said | We Did |
|---|---|
| Our phone message is unhelpful and ambiguous | The message was reviewed and changes were made to make it clearer and easy to understand. We also change the message depending on weather events and emergencies, such as Storm Eunice in February 2022. |
| Our Contact Centre Team failed to deal with reasonable enquiries | Further training and refresher courses are provided on an regular basis which follow seasonal activity to ensure that current activity is front of mind for our Contact Centre Team. For example, this includes training around gritting, grass cutting and wildlife verges. |
| Slow response | With additional training we have halved our response time to 1.13 days – previously it was 2.4. |
Compliments
To log a compliment please contact our Customer Service Team on 0345 60 80 193 or contact us online.
Complaints
In the first instance please contact our Customer Service Team on 0345 60 80 193 and inform one of our trained advisors of the nature of the issue. Our Customer Service Advisor will take all of your details as well as the details of your complaint and look to address your concerns. If you are not satisfied with this initial response, you can ask for the matter to be reviewed by our Complaints Customer Service Manager.
If you remain dissatisfied with the response you receive from our Complaints Customer Service Manager, your complaint can be escalated to the Stakeholder and Engagement Manager at East Sussex County Council. Please let us know if this is what you would like to do.
If you have followed all of the above and you are still not happy with the outcome then you would need to consider making a Corporate Complaint through the Corporate Complaints team. Please note they will only investigate complaints which have gone through the East Sussex Highway complaint process, as noted above.
Experiencing a technical issue on our website
If you run into any issues using our site please click here to see our troubleshooting FAQs and contact form.