Editor,

Allow me to express my satisfaction and give Rwanda’s Emigration and Immigration Directorate on its outstanding customer care and improved processes.

A lot has not been said about this government department which should be a reference point to both other government departments and to the private sector.

Over time, I have visited and required services from this department both at a personal level and work related services. It may not be good to compare but surely this department stands out and is at the top of customer service in the whole country.

Services at this department are supported by both empowered and committed personnel and automated systems.

The department has done a great job in process improvement where one staff attends to a customer, answers all the customer questions, guides the customer where something is lacking, there after enters the service in the system that instantly gives a customer a trucking number.

All these are done at one desk by one staff, one machine and with a smile leading to a lean process and good customer care.

What is visible at the department is that a culture has been built overtime to distinguish it and give it its own character. Staff are well dressed in uniform, they are empowered to make decisions and they also know how to use the systems.

They have strict established service delivery schedules at the head office structured in morning hours and afternoon.

The department’s website gives it its true image, its up-to-date, online services are truly working and attended to as if it is a bank running up for profit, systems that capture customers email and telephone numbers facilitate the use of feedback messages like tracking numbers and email updates.

Whoever has visited this department has witnessed this and, above all, they call if a customer takes longer to come for the feedback. Thumbs up!

See how they have improved their process at the counter, well arranged visitors chairs in a way that it leaves free movement of people, automated queue number (working) machine, TV screens displaying information, instructions and updates to customers, stand writing benches where customers fill forms from, instructions to keep silence or not to receive phone calls hanging on walls, this is uniform in all the divisions.

I have had a chance to travel outside Rwanda but one thing that you will notice different once you reach on the Rwandan border is order that exists. This both exhibited by the staff serving passengers and the arrangement of their offices. They are assisted by their automated machines like at KIA where Rwandans check in with their IDs.

Let other organs learn from this department noting that buying complicated software without organisation culture that supports systems will not work. Immigration and Emigration Directorate,  keep it up and Rwandans let us made good use of this department, visit them and learn from them.

Mbasa Rugigana