{"id":100870,"date":"2019-07-11T17:09:49","date_gmt":"2019-07-11T15:09:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/?p=100870"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:24:23","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:24:23","slug":"duo-ready-for-summer-peak-period","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2019\/07\/11\/duo-ready-for-summer-peak-period\/","title":{"rendered":"DUO ready for the summer peak period"},"content":{"rendered":"

The goal is to limit caller waiting times to no more than ten minutes, but this can\u2019t be guaranteed. \u201cIt\u2019s all hands on deck. The Education Executive Agency\u2019s (DUO) telephones are ringing off the hook<\/a> in the summer months. There\u2019s a continuous barrage of calls with questions about study financing, discontinuing public transport cards, and problems with enrolment. In the past, callers were put on hold for half an hour or even an hour. In 2018 the National Ombudsman declared<\/a> that such waiting times were unacceptably long, and political parties also raised<\/a> the alarm.<\/p>\n

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Peak<\/h2>

DUO spokeswoman Tea Jonkman hopes that these excessively long waiting times are a thing of the past, and she\u2019s feeling hopeful. There\u2019s extra funding this year: Minister Van Engelshoven released an additional 26.7 million euro for DUO in the Spring Memorandum. Part of this amount, 6.5 million euro, is meant to make it easier to get a DUO employee on the line. Since 2017, 75 extra employees have been hired to answer telephone inquiries. \u201cOnce again, new groups of employees were recruited and trained in early 2019\u201d, says Jonkman.<\/p>\n

In a campaign, DUO has called upon students and former students to not wait until the last minute to make any necessary arrangements. \u201cIf they wait too long, they\u2019ll end up calling during the summer peak period. We would prefer that the demand for our services doesn\u2019t come all at the same time.\u201d DUO also hopes to reduce the workload using a new chat functionality.<\/p>\n

Mail processing<\/h2>

DUO\u2019s ICT system<\/a>, which has been operational for a year, is also starting to bear fruit. Students and former students can arrange more matters themselves in this system, without having to use complicated forms or assistance from DUO employees. Requests and changes are immediately visible, and as a result, students have fewer questions. \u201cThanks to the new system, DUO\u2019s manual processing of incoming mail has been drastically reduced, and there has been a 20 percent drop in telephone calls in the first six months of 2019 compared to the same period in 2018\u201d, explained Van Engelshoven in response<\/a> to Parliamentary questions.<\/p>\n

The minister believes it\u2019s important that students or former students calling DUO quickly get an employee on the line to assist them, but she emphasises that in the summer period, waiting times may exceed ten minutes. However, she does expect that callers won\u2019t be waiting as long as they did in 2018.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re doing everything we can to keep caller waiting times under ten minutes. It\u2019s all hands on deck\u201d, says Jonkman. But she can\u2019t make any guarantees. \u201cYou can\u2019t predict what might happen.\u201d But according to the spokeswoman, DUO is prepared to meet the challenge.<\/p>\n\n\t

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De redactie<\/h2>\n\t\t\n\t\t
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