Further memorandum from the Department
for Work and Pensions
1. THE DISABILITY
AND CARERS
SERVICE (DCS) HELPLINE
The Committee sought further information about
the helpline statistics showing the progress made from 80% unanswered
calls to 1%, and figures relating to the range of experiences
of customers who do get through but may not speak to an adviser
straightaway.
Progress in DCS on unanswered calls
In 2004-05, 18.5 million calls to the Disability
Living Allowance (DLA) and Attendance Allowance Helpline received
the engaged tone, representing a significant and wholly unacceptable
number of customers who were unable to access it on their first
attempt. Customers who did get through were generally satisfied
with the service provided by Helpline agents; it was the inability
to get through that caused inevitable dissatisfaction. In the
summer of 2004, new equipment was installed giving increased capacity,
functionality and improved stability, acting as an enabler to
resolving the problems encountered. A forecasting and scheduling
tool was introduced and used to plan the staffing resource to
meet the customer demand. Integrated working with the core processing
unit started in April 2005, providing additional staffing to meet
peak call demands.
Various versions of the welcome message are
now used to inform customers of when the centre is particularly
busy, giving the customer the option of whether or not they would
prefer to ring back at another time. The ability to adapt the
messages has also proved successful when the business has been
affected, for example, by system problems.
A number of other changes have also been introduced,
all of which have contributed to the overall improvement to service:
— transfer of clerical forms onto the
system to speed up processing;
— introduction of "Once and Done"
actions completed at the point of call giving improved customer
and staff satisfaction;
— focus on quality with the removal
of a time bound target for agents and introduction of an independent
quality team to assess calls to support continued improvements;
and
— call listening conducted by team
leaders followed by monthly one to one meetings with staff to
support coaching and development.
The core statistics reveal the extent of the
improvement. In 2004-05, 18.5 million attempted calls received
an engaged tone; in 2005-06, just over 34,000 calls received the
engaged tone; and, in 2006-07, there was a further reduction to
27,400. It is also worth noting in this context that DCS clear
approx 93% of all calls at the first point of contact; less than
7% are transferred to another adviser or require an outbound call.
Alongside the performance metrics, DCS's customer
survey results also demonstrate the improved satisfaction of customers:
| Proportion rating the service
as excellent or very good
| Proportion rating the service
as good
|
| 2003-04 | 36 | 32
|
| 2004-05 | 55 | 23
|
| 2005-06 | 76 | 17
|
| 2006-07 | 93.8 | 4.8
|
Additional Information
Helpline (Telephone number 08457 123456)
The Helpline number is an 0845 number. This number is a reduced
rate tariff (formally known as lo-call) and, from a landline,
normally costs the customer no more than 4 pence per minute. The
cost varies if dialling from an operator other than BT or mobiles.
The cost for the call starts as soon as the customer hears the
welcome message. We also provide a separate textphone number for
customers with hearing difficulties.
Welcome Messages
A range of messages is available for different situations,
including:
Standard Welcome Message
This advises customers that they have reached the Helpline
and that their call may be recorded for training purposes. It
also offers customers with urgent business (such as the notification
of a death) the facility to "queue jump".
"Heavy Demand" message
Like all call centres, the Helpline experiences peaks in
demand. Forecast peaks—such as Monday morning—are
dealt with routinely by enhancing resources in a planned way.
Unexpected peaks are generally caused by matters outside DWP's
control—such as media articles about benefits—and
in those circumstances, this message is used to advise customers
that, if their business is not urgent, they may prefer to call
at another time.
Abandoned Calls
DCS monitors the number of calls where the customer has hung
up the phone before speaking to an agent. "Abandoned calls"
occur for a variety of reasons eg they do not wish to wait any
longer and will phone back, they realise they need some paperwork
before speaking to an agent, the doorbell goes etc. Customers
may also abandon their call when there is a "comfort"
message on the network which makes the call unnecessary. For example,
we used a comfort message to advise customers that they could
ignore a letter from the Post Office advising them about a change
to its banking service provider, since this did not affect their
benefit entitlement or payment.
2. CABINET SECRETARY'S
INDIVIDUAL AWARD
FOR OUTSTANDING
ACHIEVEMENT
The Committee referred to the Cabinet Secretary's individual
award for outstanding achievement and sought details of the outstanding
achievement that was celebrated. I am delighted to say that this
award was made to Sorwar Ahmed, a call centre agent for The Pension
Service based in the North East. In the words of the judges, he
has "delivered an exemplary level of service both to customers
and his colleagues, consistently going `the extra mile' to `exceed
expectations'".
3. COMPLAINTS TO
VOLUNTARY AND
PRIVATE SECTOR
PROVIDERS
The Committee asked if we had any information and analysis
on complaints that go to voluntary sector providers and private
sector providers as compared to complaints that arise from public
sector delivery of services. Unfortunately we have no reliable
data on this.
4. REMOTE STORAGE
The Committee asked about the file store run by Capita (formerly
run by Iron Mountain), a private contractor.
This is a large store holding some 48 million files. In each
of the last 12 months the store has been consistently able to
identify and provide over 99% of the files thought to be held
by it.
The recovery rate is always likely to be less than 100% as
requests will include:
— files which have been delayed in transit to the
store and so had not arrived at the time of the request;
— files mislaid/misdirected either by the courier
on route to the store or in the office after delivery; and
— files believed to be at the Document Management
Centre but which are not in fact there.
Precise figures are set out in the following table:
DEPARTMENT MANAGEMENT CENTRE FILE RETRIEVAL RATES—12
MONTHS TO FEBRUARY 2007
Month | Files Despatched
| Files not found | Total Requested
| Retrieval rate |
| March | 113,660 | 1,038
| 114,698 | 99.10 |
| April | 99,585 | 737
| 100,322 | 99.27 |
| May | 112,874 | 835
| 113,709 | 99.27 |
| June | 127,372 | 760
| 128,132 | 99.41 |
| July | 125,649 | 722
| 126,371 | 99.43 |
| August | 139,695 | 923
| 140,618 | 99.34 |
| September | 137,501 | 1,076
| 138,577 | 99.22 |
| October | 167,637 | 1,089
| 168,726 | 99.35 |
| November | 171,005 | 1,281
| 172,286 | 99.26 |
| December | 139,326 | 996
| 140,322 | 99.29 |
| January | 197,760 | 1,454
| 199,214 | 99.27 |
| February | 185,600 | 1,286
| 186,886 | 99.31 |
Year | 1,717,664 |
12,197 | 1,729,861 | 99.29
|
There is no comparative data available on the number of files
not found when the store was directly run by the Department.
5. STAFF TURNOVER
As at the end of January 2007 the Department's annual turnover
rate was 6.34%. In accordance with Cabinet Office Guidance, the
formula used by the Department to calculate staff turnover is:
— the number of leavers in a rolling 12-month period
divided by the average of staff in post at the beginning and the
end of that period.
All staff leaving the Department are included in the turnover
calculation, with the exception of those who leave the Department
under managed exit schemes, those whose temporary contracts have
ended, and those staff whose job function has transferred or been
privatised.
Currently, the average length of job tenure within the Department
is slightly over 15 years with the highest levels of turnover
amongst staff who have been with the Department for less than
two years.
Current levels of staff turnover and the average length of
service have been broadly stable for some years.
April 2007
|
