Call centre: The 1823 Citizen's Easy Link offers a one-stop enquiry service.

Callers have found the 1823 Citizen's Easy Link service satisfactory, with an average score of 4.2 in a five-point scale in a survey of 8,000 callers, the Efficiency Unit says.

Easy Link is a one-stop shop for citizens to make a range of enquiries and complaints around the clock. The service has taken over the enquiry hotlines of 13 Government departments and organisations and handled more than five million calls.

Calls have grown from 20,000 to 30,000 a month at the time of inception to over 200,000 recently, showing rapid growth in call volume and a high degree of public acceptance.

On average, 70% of calls are answered within 12 seconds. For others the average waiting time is 17 to 44 seconds before a caller will be connected to a customer service operator.

In 2004 and so far in 2005, the percentage of callers giving up on their calls was low at 2.9% to 6.5%.