THE poor performance of Worcestershire's council contact centre can today be revealed - with targets missed across the board.

A new report has lifted the lid on the under-fire Worcestershire Hub, which deals with anywhere from 37,000 to 100,000 public queries a month on everything from potholes to bus passes.

It reveals:

- At the face-to-face service at The Hive, average waiting times have DOUBLED in one year, from eight minutes to over 17 minutes

- For those trying to contact staff by phone, just 57 per cent of calls were answered within 20 seconds, missing an in-house target of 75 per cent

- The number of "repeat contacts", people trying to get a second conversation on the same topic, rose from 19 per cent to 33 per cent of all calls, with the report warning of people getting "conflicting advice" on issues like benefits entitlement

The data relates to the period between July and September this year, comparing it with the same three-month period in 2013.

It says The Hive's face-to-face query centre was swamped with 1,200 more visitors than the previous year, and that "staffing issues" made the delays worse.

The target for people being seen at The Hive is supposed to be 15 minutes.

It also says the phone call service was hampered by a "huge seasonal peak" in queries around school transport during August and September.

But the data has led to fresh criticism about the shared service, which employs 52 people and serves Worcester City Council, Malvern Hills District Council and the county council.

The councils are in the final stages of trying to tie up a deal with private firm Civica to take it over from April, as we first revealed last month.

Labour Councillor Lynn Denham said: "This report says the calls went up due to queries around school transport, but this happens every year.

"The face-to-face waiting times at The Hive are up significantly, in fact compared to last year it's doubled. It's a poor result.

"Benefits advice is about people's lives. It's a real, real concern."

Civica currently runs the revenue and benefits service at the civic centre in Pershore as a separate operation.

Councillor Lucy Hodgson, cabinet member for customer services at the city council, said: "There is a real issue over resilience at the hub.

"This is one of the reasons why the hub needs to change.

"There have been staffing issues which have impacted on the face-to-face service and spikes in demand such as school transport queries."