NPDC Leads the Way for Consents and Inspections

When it comes to resource consents, and building consents and inspections, New Plymouth District Council leads the way.

An independent national survey of 22 councils found that the highest satisfaction rating in all three categories came from NPDC customers.

“We’ve spent a lot of time in recent years talking with customers about how we can improve our services in these areas, and we’re seeing the results in this survey,” says Manager Customer and Regulatory Services Simon Pickford.

“The key thing for us is that we recognise our customers aren’t just coming in here for a consent or a building inspection: They’re coming in here to make their dream home or their dream business a reality. We help them achieve that big picture.”

For overall satisfaction, customers gave NPDC 79.7 per cent for building consents, 86 per cent for building inspections and 63.6 per cent for resource consents. The ranges for all 22 councils in these three areas were from 55.3 to 79.7 per cent (building consents), from 69.4 to 86 per cent (building inspections), and from 58.8 to 63.6 per cent (resource consents).

Each of these three categories were broken down into whether customers would recommend that city or district to others as a good development location, whether the process helped them achieve a more successful outcome for their project, and whether the legislation helped the customer achieve a safe and durable structure. NPDC ranked highest in all of these areas.

Mr Pickford says the comments made by respondents to the survey will help NPDC improve its services further.

“There were some specific comments made that will be really useful for us to make the process even easier for customers,” he says.