Wilma discovers: 70,000 customer queries a year

In this column, new Director General Wilma van Wezenbeek is getting to know the KB. Behind the scenes, she meets colleagues who do important work that not everyone is aware of. This work is often done on an impressive scale. Today: the Customer Service team.
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The KB building has a complicated layout. New employees are advised to just shout "Help!" if they get lost. Fortunately, I haven't had to do that even though the Customer Service team colleagues I am on the way to meet are located in part of the building I am not familiar with. I arrive without getting lost and am warmly welcomed by Matine van der Haar. 

Matine is the team's coordinator. She makes sure her 20 colleagues can properly carry out their job. And that’s some task, especially considering they have to answer around 70,000 customer queries every year. 

Seventy thousand is quite a lot, isn’t it? "Yes, but these are also questions about the online Library, not just the KB", Matine explains. "The KB is responsible for this service and we receive about 60,000 enquiries regarding the online Library a year. The remaining questions mainly concern KB membership and KB services such as Delpher.nl and DBNL.org (the Digital Library for Dutch Literature), insofar as these cannot be answered by colleagues at our public information desks."

Sixty thousand enquiries about the online Library averages out to around 160 per day. "We have peak periods", says Matine. "The beginning of the summer holidays is a notoriously busy time. People are dusting off their e-readers and trying to once again figure out how to get an e-book from the online Library onto their device. We get a lot of questions relating to this." 

Other questions often concern issues such as the online Library's app, which unfortunately has some bugs, membership and logging in. Customer service has noticed a gradual drop in enquires about the latter category thanks to Single Identity, Matine explains. "With Single Identity, members only need one login for all library services. So you can now use your login details for the local library to also log in to the online Library. This simplifies the process and makes it more efficient."

New chat function

How do these enquiries actually reach us? "Through email, phone, a contact form and, recently, the low-threshold chat function. We’re really happy with that. Last month, the online Library received 500 questions via this function. We also provide webcare. These are questions and requests that come in through social media. For example, we could receive a request to add a particular title to the collection, which is then passed on to the relevant department. Webcare is also available on the weekends and in the evenings. This is especially handy since that is when people do a lot of reading for pleasure."

"We also always try to think along with our customers", Matine says in conclusion. "The other day, we were contacted by a mother whose daughter isn’t able to read very well. We then recommend a service like Yoleo or Passend Lezen, a library service for people with reading difficulties. This helps us go the extra mile when assisting people, which is our true ambition. The information we get from our readers is what helps us to develop the KB's services further. In that respect, we are the starting point of progress. And we have plenty of ideas about that."

Duly noted, Matine!

Wilma van Wezenbeek