After more than a year of COVID-19 lockdowns, Government offices continue to operate at limited capacities and Government contact centers continue to play a central role in delivering services to citizens across the country. In many instances, those needing assistance from federal, state, or local governments must still rely on the services available through contact centers and government websites to meet their needs. At face value, the GCCSI improved four points in 2021. However, a deep dive into the data reveals some interesting dynamics at play.

First, about half the 2021 respondents are customers that, prior to the pandemic, typically visited an office in-person to interact with their respective agencies. Second, it’s the former office visitors that are responsible for driving the GCCSI score higher. In fact, if not for these former office visitors, the GCCSI would have declined to the lowest score in eight years. The findings from this year’s study raise some important questions regarding the future of government customer service models. In many ways, the pandemic accelerated the otherwise relatively slow evolution. For most agencies, it is unclear what permanent changes will result from the restrictions of the past year.

Will customers return to their previous customer service preferences? If not, which customer service channels will customers gravitate towards? How has this time impacted the evolution of technology-based service channels? What will be the ultimate impact on customer satisfaction? While this report doesn’t provide all of the answers, the findings of our study do point to some of the critical questions that will need to be answered going forward. Additionally, it emphasizes the need to closely monitor the evolution of customer behavior in order to ensure customer service models are meeting expectations in the most efficient and cost-effective ways without allowing customer satisfaction to suffer.