Letter to the Chairman of the Social Security
Committee from Rt Hon Andrew Smith MP, Minister of State for Employment,
Welfare to Work and Equal Opportunities and Ms Angela Eagle MP,
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Social Security (SG
44)
When giving oral evidence to the joint Select
Committees on the new ONE pilots last week, we undertook to come
back to you on a few points. You have also subsequently written,
asking for some more information related to targets and evaluation,
which we attach.
Firstly there was the issue of the number of
clients which ONE personal advisers can expect to have on their
caseload. Although we have issued detailed guidance to ONE staff
on how caseloads can be more effectively managed, we have been
careful not to specify exactly how many clients each adviser should
have on his books at one time. This is in recognition of the fact
that the needs of ONE clients will vary considerably. We might
expect the range to be anywhere between 30 and 100 clients. Some
advisers are likely to have smaller caseloads of harder to help
clients, whilst others will have larger caseloads of those who
are more job-ready. A proportion of the caseload is also likely
to be "dormant": that is, not wishing to participate
in the ONE service for the time being. We do need, therefore,
flexibility in the size of the caseload for the personal adviser
service to operate as it should.
Another question which arose in our meeting
was that of the length of the registration and orientation interview.
It has always been our intention that this intervention will be
reasonably short, allowing clients' benefit needs to be identified
quickly and for the officer to arrange the more in-depth personal
adviser interview, or to assess that this should take place later
or not at all. For this reason, the registration and orientation
interview is timed to last an average of 20 minutes, although
its exact length will of course depend on the individual client.
In the call centre the average will be longer—about 40 minutes—which
will allow time for the client's claim forms to be filled in over
the phone.
A third point raised was the proportion of the
capacity of the various call centre pilots that will be taken
up with the "overflow" from other areas. The idea of
the "overflow" is to improve customer service: if all
the operators in a particular area are busy, the clients's call
will be re-routed to another area, rather than their hearing an
engaged tone. This will be for the initial, three minute call,
which the client makes. Every effort will be made to ensure that
the adviser who calls the client back for the 40 minute registration
and orientation interview comes from the same region as the client.
This is to recognise the value of local knowledge in advising
clients. Some of the call centre areas have larger capacities
than others, because they have access to more advisers and larger
premises. It may be that those with larger capacities will handle
more overflow calls, although it is difficult at this stage to
predict exactly what the volume will be at any time. As we made
clear at the Committee hearing, we do want to keep overflow work
to a reasonable minimum compatible with overall operational efficiency.
On the issue of deprived areas, we should explain
that the answer we gave was in response to questions about the
selection of the pilots in representing deprived areas, particularly
inner cities. The previous comments by officials were designed
to explain the scope of the evaluation and its primary units of
analysis.
The pilots were designed to be nationally representative.
The location of the pilots includes areas with characteristics
associated with deprived areas, for example, with a concentration
of minority ethnic groups and areas where homelessness is an issue.
The evaluation will identify areas where there are difficulties
in providing the ONE service and the implications for its delivery.
The evaluation will consider the factors that are associated with
the labour market outcomes across each variant, and this will
include indicators such as the concentration of minority ethnic
groups.
We have learnt since our meeting with you that * * * although
you will understand that this information is commercial in confidence.
We are writing in similar terms to Derek Foster.
30 June 1999
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