Southwark hails success of 'Ask Austin'

Visitors to the site are able to email a named contact straight away, in the form of Austin Jones, rather than sending their message to an impersonal auto-responder service. Jones is Southwark's new media officer, and he has even made a few guest appearances in the forum of this website.

Since Austin's smiling face became a daily feature on the Southwark Council website, email queries have shot up from thirty a month to around thirty a day.

Austin says: "The fact that it is a clearly identifiable human being they are emailing to rather than an impersonal computer system means that people are more comfortable using the system."

Austin answers questions on everything from residents' basic council tax queries to overseas visitors trying to trace long lost ancestors from Southwark.

"There is an awful lot of useful information held on our website," said Austin. "Part of my job is simply helping direct people to the bits that are important to them."