Circular issued to prevent delays in responses from govt officials to public inquiries

A circular has been issued for government officials with regard to responding to the letters, e-mails and telephone calls received from the general public.

The communiqué was published by the Secretary to the Ministry of Public Administration, Home Affairs, Provincial Councils and Local Government, Mr. P.K. Mayadunne on August 29.

Observations have been made that due to the Covid-19 pandemic situation and the fuel crisis in the country, there has been a delay in reply to letters, e-mail and phone calls received from the public to government agencies, he remarked.

The ministerial secretary noted that government officials are obliged to promptly respond to the letters, e-mails and telephone calls received by them, rather than the public coming to the state institutions regularly to accomplish a certain task at the expense of their time, effort and money.

The communiqué stressed that priority should be given to the letters sent to public institutions by the general public.

In a situation that a final reply cannot be sent immediately, it is required to send an interim reply within a week stating that the letter was received and to send a final reply within four weeks, it read further.

Further, when sending replies to all official letters, the direct telephone number, fax number and e-mail address of the staff officer in charge of the subject should be mentioned below the signature of the letter.

With regard to responding to e-mails, Mr. Mayadunne said the mail sent to the common e-mail addresses should be checked daily and an officer should specially be appointed for the purpose.

In the meantime, mails sent to the email addresses of the staff officers should also be checked daily, he added.

Government officials are urged the pay thorough attention to replying to the letters sent to the e-mail addresses in above mentioned manner on the same day and interim reply should be sent indicating the time required for replying whilst acknowledging the receipt of the mail in case where it is not possible to reply on the same day.

Further, action should be taken to reply for such inquiries within a reasonable period within the informed time period, Mr. Mayadunne said further.

Meanwhile, actions should be taken to answer all the telephone calls made to the office and an officer should be appointed specially to answer such calls, if the numbers of incoming calls received by any institution/ division are high, according to the circular.

It noted that a specific officer should be appointed to register the incoming calls and such officer should be vigilant to note down the name of the caller, the matter and the telephone number to be replied.

Staff officers/ officers in charge of the subjects should take actions to reply within a reasonable period regarding the matters for which immediate replies cannot/ difficult to be made.

Circulr - Replying to the Letters, E-mails and Telephone Call Received From the Public by Ada Derana on Scribd