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(a) Increasing collection of contribution arrears (excluding central payments section) by £13.3 million over the 1991-92 outturn. (

(b) Increasing class 1 identified from survey (arrears and in-year savings) by £12 million over the 1991-92 outturn.

Increase the number of surveys to 114,000, including 17,000 employer educational visits.

Actively identify 40,000 persons with class 2 liability.

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2. Performance--Records Maintenance

Process 98 per cent. of available employers' end of year returns by 31 December 1992.

Correct 83 per cent. of rejects from employers' end of year returns by 31 march 1993.

3. Performance--Customer Service/Information Provision

Clear 99 per cent. of benefit inquiries handled clerically in three working days to 98 per cent. accuracy.

Dispatch either a full reply, or an informative response, to 95 per cent. of all customer inquiries within 10 working days of receipt. Complete action to register acceptable personal pension cases and process straightforward termination notices for 92 per cent. of all cases within 28 working days of receipt.

Provide a level of public service considered to be satisfactory by at least 75 per cent. of customers surveyed.

4. Resource Management

To manage the agency's resources so as to deliver its business plan within a total budget of £142 million.

Achieve new efficiency savings of £2.6 million.

Information Technology Services Agency--

1. General

To manage the agency's resources so as to deliver agreed services within the approved 1992-93 running cost and capital allocations and accruals based budgets ;

to achieve running cost business efficiency savings of 3.9 per cent ; and

to produce monthly profiles and actual monitoring data for all general and financial targets.

2. Quality of Service

Service availability--93 per cent of district offices will receive at least the weekly service availability level agreed in the relevant customer service level agreement each month ; and

on-line response time--the average response time for on-line services is set at seven seconds or less across 95 per cent. of all responses.

3. Financial

Unit cost and financial ratio targets are set but are not published for reasons of commercial confidentiality.

Resettlement Agency--

1. Customer Care

Not less than 90 per cent. of published facilities to be provided. Survey of residents to confirm that not less than 85 per cent. express satisfaction with standards.

2. Resource Management

To manage the agency's resources so as to deliver its business plan within a total budget of £25.517 million, including £14.196 million for the costs of existing resettlement units and agency HQ. To achieve £0.3 million in new efficiency savings to be reallocated to grants for replacement providers.

3. Disengagement Strategy

Make satisfactory alternative provision for four resettlement units and then disengage from running them by 31 March 1993.

Secure commitments to satisfactory alternative provision for a further four units, and then announce decisions to disengage from running them during 1993-94, by 31 March 1993.

Child Support Unit--

Responsibility for the Department's existing work on collecting maintenance for children will pass in April 1992 from the Benefits Agency to the new child support unit, in preparation for the launch of the child support agency in 1993. The unit's service delivery and financial targets will be :

Percentage of lone parents making new and repeat claims for income support for whom maintenance is arranged--20 per cent.

Number of lone parents already in receipt of income

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support on 6 April 1992 for whom maintenance is arranged--24,000. Annual Benefit Savings--£320 million.

To manage the unit's resources so as to deliver its business plan within a total budget of £86 million.

In addition to the above, agencies also have milestone targets to be achieved during 1992-93. Details of these will be published in agency annual business plans. Some of the above budget allocation figures differ from the plans published in the DSS report--Cm 1914. This is due to recent transfers between budgets.

Clearance times normally cover the period from date of receipt of the claim in the agency to the formal decision by the adjudication officer or equivalent. Notification of the result is normally issued by the following day. All days refer to working days.

Based on "calculated" measure, reflecting work outstanding, work processed and working days in the

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month, measuring from date of entry to date of clearance on statistical record sheet or, for social fund, from date of claim. The target value is subject to assumption about the number of cases still requiring further inquiries following procedural changes in April 1992.

By comparison, the current targets for attendance allowance is 70 per cent. in 50 days and 95 per cent. in 90 days. The current target for mobility allowance is an average of 37 days, but is not directly comparable.

Based on a forecast workload of 102,000 new cases, compared with an original forecast for 1992-93 of 69,500 claims : the target to be varied subject to work loads.

Incapacity benefits is an overall term used to cover sickness benefit, invalidity benefit, severe disablement allowance and maternity allowance.

These two targets are together broadly equivalent to a target of 27 per cent. of all lone parents on income support receiving maintenance.

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