One-stop service

While many members of the Harvard community were enjoying their summer break, the University’s parking, housing, and ID services were unified into one beautifully renovated Campus Service Center.

Located on the eighth floor of Holyoke Center, the new “one-stop shop” helps customers find housing and get parking permits and ID cards. Instead of scrambling among the Blackstone complex and multiple floors of Holyoke, customers can make one visit to the Campus Service Center and be helped by representatives trained to assist with any service. “We deliver more than a product,” says Susan Richelson, the new center’s manager, “we provide resources and one-to-one assistance in person and on the phone to help customers navigate each program and troubleshoot any issue presented. …We want to ensure that our customers get what they need in one stop if possible.”

Customers found the center convenient during the busy mid-August to mid-September season; already, the center has processed 330 housing rent payments, responded to 1,180 emails, sold 2,033 parking permits, and made 3,290 ID cards.  Richelson recalls a graduate student from Ireland who came to the center to get an ID card and find housing.  He and his wife were new to Cambridge and didn’t realize how scarce rental housing is in the fall.  Over several days, the center provided guidance on how to use the housing site and encouraged them to use the lobby computers (placed there for customers seeking housing).  The center made sure they had every useful resource and web link to help them find their new home.

The center, with a comfortable waiting area and two conference rooms where customers can meet with representatives to discuss confidential transactions, “receives many comments that it looks really great,” Richelson said. “Students and staff also love the beautiful view of the river Houses, MAC, and the Charles that they see when they are standing at the transaction counter. We don’t need artwork anymore as the view is so beautiful!”

The Campus Service Center was designed so that new offerings can be brought on over time. The team is already planning for the November addition of the Global Support Services Travel Registry program. For the latest information visit the website.