Bury Register Office
Town Hall
Manchester Road
Bury
BL9 0SW
Office opening hours
9.00am to 4.30pm Monday to Friday,
closed from 2.00pm on first Thursday of each month for staff training.
Citizenship ceremonies are held from 2.00pm on the third Tuesday of each month till March. From the 1st April 2009 Citizenship ceremonies will be held on the first Saturday of each month from 10.00am
For more information on Citizenship ceremonies contact the Home Office.
Extended hours for Ceremonies on a Saturday from 10.00am until 4.00pm.
Please note: our ceremony suite accomodates up to 50 guests.
Telephone : 0161 253 6026
Fax : 0161 253 6028
Email : registeroffice@bury.gov.uk
The Register Office operates an appointment system for registering births, deaths and marriages. Please telephone 0161 253 6026 for an appointment.
Useful web sites
Immigration and Nationality Directorate - home page
General Register Office - Office of National Statistics web site
Lancashire Family History web site
Bury Registration Service Delivery Plan
Bury Register Office Service Plan
1. INTRODUCTION
Team Functions and Purpose
The Bury Register Office is located at:-
The Town Hall, Manchester Road, Bury BL9 0SW.
Telephone number for enquiries or to make an appointment to register a Birth, Death, Still-Birth or arrange a Marriage or Civil Partnership.
0161 253 6026
In Emergency (out of hours)
0161 253 6639
Office Hours
9.00 A.M. to 4.30 P.M.
Monday to Friday
• The registration of all births, deaths and still births occurring within the borough
• Conducting citizenship ceremonies for approximately 140 Bury residents who make application for British Nationality annually.
• Safe custody of all historic records of births, deaths and marriages dating back to 1837 and issue of certified copies from these records on demand.
• Taking notices of intended marriage and civil partnership from persons resident within the borough.
• Conducting and registration of all civil marriages and civil partnerships taking place in any venue licensed for the purpose.
• Inspection and registration of new venues for marriage and civil partnership.
• Giving assistance and advice to customers on all aspects of registration and citizenship.
Objectives
To provide an excellent registration service to all sections of the community
• Listening to and involving our customers and being responsive to their needs;
• Providing high quality services that give value for money and are based on best practice;
• Being innovative and creative in seeking continuous improvement;
• Cultivating the enthusiasm and commitment of our staff;
Developing and retaining highly skilled and valued staff that are empowered to deliver our goals.
In order to deliver on these high level objectives we are pursuing a number of initiatives that have been developed in consultation with all members of the team.
• A programme of customer consultation to ensure services are developed and delivered in accordance with customer demand.
• Utilising the North West Regional Groups benchmarking tool to test service provision against other providers in the region.
• Review the processes within the unit to ensure that we are making best use of the resources available.
• Further developing regular communication channels with all members of the team including once monthly training sessions and whole team away days.
• Developing projects in which all team members can have input.
Partnership Working
Our partners play an essential role in helping us to achieve our service objectives.
Health Service
The majority of births and deaths occur in Fairfield General Hospital. After evaluating the results of a survey conducted on birth and death informants it was clear that the vast majority wished to register at the hospital. The Hospital Trust were approached and declined our offer to send registrars to the hospital. At the moment there is no room for a registrar at the hospital but this will be reviewed by the PCT in the future.We will however, be attending Sure Start at Whitefield from October 2008, details will be on the website when final arrangements have been made.
Coroners Service
We also rely heavily on the Coroners Service to provide an efficient service to bereaved relatives at times of great stress. We do have a reasonable relationship with the Coroners Officers at the moment but there is scope for improvement in joint working arrangements. A meeting was held with the Coroner at Oldham and issues were raised regarding weekend cover for death registration. Weekend cover is being reviewed and a further meeting with the Coroner will be arranged later in the year.
General Register Office
The GRO are responsible for formulating the legislative framework that governs the registration service nationally.
Pressures for change
• Reform and Modernisation Agenda for Civil Registration.
The demise of the Regulatory Reform Order (RRO) which would have heralded fundamental change in the registration service has led to the General Register Office, in partnership with LACORS, looking at ways in which some reforms suggested in the RRO could be taken forward without the need for primary legislation.
All statutory registration officers have now become local government officers.
• Web Based System
The Registrar General has introduced a web based registration system to replace the current locally based IT system. Bury were at the forefront of this system being introduced as we acted as a pilot office prior to national introduction on 26th March 2007. This has enabled registrars to populate a central data base with registration information, print off loose leaf register pages instead of hand writing a register and issue certified copies from the system. This is intended to speed up the registration process and deliver improvements in customer service. It will also enable copies of registrations to be available immediately to the General Register Office alleviating the requirement to send in paper copies each quarter.
• Review of Advice
The Registrar General is reviewing the advice given to local authorities on the interpretation of the registration acts. She has pledged to have a more flexible approach which will hopefully allow front line service managers to deliver services more in line with customer expectations.
• New Governance Arrangements
A joint local authority working group has recommended that the current scheme arrangements be modified to make them more customer focused and provide local authorities with more discretion to adjust staffing levels in accordance with demand. The key change would commit local authorities to publish a comprehensive set of service standards to at least the level of a set of minimum standards set by central government in a Code of Practice. This would be underpinned by a Good Practice Guide which contains advice on standard setting, best practice and record management. Bury intend to adhere to the Good Practice Guide but not sign up to new governance arrangements at this stage.
• Civil Partnership Act 2005
This Act introduced same sex partnership registration, which give couples similar legal rights to married couples. All staff attended the Gay wedding Fair at Manchester Town Hall and we arranged a Gay awareness seminar at the Register Office last year where the lesbian and gay community were invited to give their views on how Bury should provide the service. Elected Members also attended including the Leader and Deputy Leader. The policy to charge the same fees for civil partnership as marriages was agreed as was the decision to insist that all Approved Premises in the borough provide services for civil partnerships and marriages. A ceremony was produced and agreed in consultation with the lesbian and gay community and this has proved very successful. It has been agreed that all civil partners who have given notice or had ceremonies will be invited to an open evening to be held at the office to obtain feedback so that we may adjust service delivery to meet customer demand.
A further meeting took place in November 2007 when all couples who had either had civil partnership ceremonies or given notice were invited to an open evening. This was to enable us to obtain feedback on service delivery.
All Elected Members were invited and I am pleased to say that two members attended the meeting including the Deputy Leader of the Council.
The meeting proved very successful and resulted in an overall satisfaction rating of 100%.
• Customer Surveys and Consultation
A survey was conducted last year on the preference of our customers on where, when and how to register births, deaths and marriages.
Births
This indicated that 100% of customers wished to register face to face with a registrar.
90% of customers wished to register at the hospital.
Deaths
100% of customers wished to register face to face with a registrar.
71% of customers wished to register at the hospital.
To meet customer demand we requested that Fairfield Hospital engage in a pilot project to register births and deaths at the hospital but they declined.
Although the Trust have declined our offer they have advised that this will be reviewed in the future provided there is room at the hospital for a registrar.
Opening Hours
90% of customers were satisfied with the current opening hours of 9.30 am to 4.30 pm.
Despite most customers being satisfied with our current opening hours we have extended our opening times from 9.00 am to 4.30 pm and making appointments for those customers who request early morning or evening between 8.00 am and 6.00 pm.
Saturday morning by appointment.
• Registration Service Good Practice Guide
Initially Bury Register Office will commit to providing service levels to meet the National Standards contained within the Good Practice Guide.
From the results of the surveys conducted it can be seen that we have exceeded the National Standard and from 2009/10 the service commits to achieving “Good Practice” standards of service contained within the Good Practice Guide.
Key Activities
1. Consultation. Service users, stakeholders- Annually
2. Service Delivery & Improvement Plan (Based on results of surveys)
3. Reporting and monitoring, publication of Service Delivery Plan reflecting needs & expectations of customers & the rights of the general public.
Customer Satisfaction Survey Results
A comprehensive customer satisfaction survey was undertaken between 1st October 2007 and 31st January 2008 to evaluate the level of service Bury Register Office is providing to customers.
The results are as follows :-
Birth Registration
From 300 surveys issued to customers 114 were completed and returned.
96% of customers were satisfied with the current opening hours of the office.
96% of respondents were offered an appointment within 3 working days of first point of contact.
97% of respondents were seen by a registrar within 10 minutes of their appointment time.
Death & Still-Birth Registration
From 200 surveys issued to customers 80 responses were received.
88% of customers were satisfied with the current opening hours of the office.
97% of customers were offered an appointment within 2 working days of first point of contact.
97% of customers were seen by a registrar within 10 minutes of their appointment time.
Marriage and Civil Partnership Notices
From 150 surveys issued to customers 62 were completed and returned.
87% of customers were satisfied with the current opening hours of the office.
100% of customers were offered an appointment within 5 working days of first point of contact.
98% of customers were seen by a registrar within 5 minutes of their appointment time.
Marriage and Civil Partnership Ceremonies
From 50 surveys issued to customers 23 were completed and returned.
100% of respondents rated the overall service as very good 91.3% and good 8.7%.
100% of respondents were given their preferred time and date of ceremony. We
continue to improve the level of service in our ceremonies and we have extended
the time for each from 30 to 45 minutes, providing more time for photographs etc.
Citizenship Ceremonies
From 40 surveys issued to customers 19 responses were received.
100% of respondents rated the overall service as excellent 89% or good 11%.
100% of respondents were offered a ceremony within one month of the first point of contact.
Overall customer satisfaction rating 96.6%.
Introduction of Nationality Checking Service.
After receiving more than 100 telephone requests for the service it has been decided that Bury will be introducing the service in 2009. Two officers will receive Home Office training with a view to commencement in 2009.
• New Technology
We have now purchased an electronic diary system which records the times when customers are seen and 96% of all customers were seen within 20 minutes of their appointment time. A new version of the web based system will be available shortly and we will be reducing the time from when a customer arrives to when they are seen from 20 to 10 minutes. The diary system will also allow customers to make appointments themselves on line. This facility will be available from 1st April 2009.
Achieving Savings
The Register Office has accepted a reduction in its budget of £9000 year on year and will make up this amount in increased fees.
