Memorandum from Immigration and Nationality
Directorate
1. Please could you indicate the four most
significant (in terms of size) services your department provides
to individual citizens, either directly or through its agencies?
a. How many people receive each service (to
the nearest 50,000)
IND operates a statutory control function in
the operation of the immigration, asylum and nationality laws.
A range of IND functions are now charged for and are more obviously
a provision of a public service. Nonetheless, much of IND's operations
relate to or deal with individuals and the following information
sets out available information. If the Committee has any further
questions, we will be happy to reply.
Figures which indicate the volume of business
within IND are published on a regular basis and can be viewed
at the following web address:
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/immigration1.html
Published figures illustrate the high volume
of applications dealt with by IND.
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| For the financial year 2005-06 (with one exception—non-EEA passenger numbers):
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| Operational areas | Numbers of applications/passengers (ie users)
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| UK visa applications received in 2005-06 |
2,550,300 |
| Non-EEA passengers admitted in 2005 | 11.8 million
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| Managed Migration |
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| Applications made in the financial year 2005-06 for Nationality and Right of Abode (to the nearest 1,000):
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| Nationality | 188,000 |
| Right of Abode | 7,000 |
| Work Permit Schemes |
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| The relevant number of applications for 2005-06 for major schemes administered by Work Permits (UK) are:
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| Work Permits (including Sector Based Scheme)
| 169,000 |
| Worker Registration Scheme | 297,000
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| Work Permit Leave to Remain | 62,000* (Figure is 104,000 including dependants)
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| It also runs two smaller schemes: |
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| Highly Skilled Migrant Programme | 43,000
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| Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme | 19,000
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| The number of Further Leave to Remain & Indefinite Leave to Remain applications (for Lead Applicants) created by General Group for FY05/06
| 369,400 |
| Asylum applications |
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| Asylum applications (ex. Dependents) received in 2005-06
| 25,200 |
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b. What is the cost of each service to the public purse?
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Subject to provisos over the definition of what constitutes
provision of a public service in respect of IND's responsibilities,
the following figures provide a broad guide of anticipated costs.
2006-07 budgets (£m):
— Enforcement/removals 177.
— Managed migration 105 [gross cost—offset
by 212 income].
2. What formal systems do you have for gathering customer
feedback?
| Yes/No | Cost p/a
(information provided where identifiable costs are available)
|
| Facility on website | Yes—here is the hyper link—
http://www.ind.homeoffice.gov.uk/contactus/complaints
UKvisas will be launching an on line questionnaire in February 2007.
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| Response cards at offices | Yes—in public enquiry offices.
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| Focus groups | Planned within Managed Migration for 2007-08.
From time to time we expect to run focus groups of users and the general public to increase our understanding of the reasons for their attitudes. not yet defined
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| User surveys | a. Managed Migration bi-annual survey
| a. £50K |
| b. An on-going Complainants Survey form is sent out by a member of staff in the Customer Focus Team. A chaser is sent after six weeks. The Complaints Audit Committee use this information in order to gauge customer satisfaction. Further, we are also going to introduce quarterly reviewing of the results within the team.
| b. Not separately identified, but cost is minimal.
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| c. UK visas introduced user surveys at posts abroad in 2006.
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| d. In addition to the various customer and user surveys, IND also has recently begun six monthly surveys testing wider public confidence in how the immigration system is managed, and to help the business improve by understanding the issues which drive public concerns.
| d. Approximately £45K per survey |
| Analysis of complaints | Complaints are analysed by local business areas rather than centrally.
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| Other (please specify) | Posters along with Complaints & Compliments leaflets are available at all public areas to facilitate complaints and comments. These set out the process (how to complain/compliment/suggest) and are for information only and are not a channel for providing feedback.
| Approx £944 per 1,000
leaflets printed
numbers used
2004—12,000
2005—4,500
2006—500
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| Stakeholder management—some local business areas eg Asylum Appeals elicit feedback from external stakeholders through regular meetings and email updates. Managed Migration and UKvisas operate a sector based stakeholder engagement system designed to inform policy and strengthen operational delivery.
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| UKvisas is currently setting up an MP Customer feedback survey.
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| We are committed to engaging our stakeholders in the operation of our business, and have developed a joint statement of principles with them.
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3. Which systems are most effective?
Within Managed Migration, the evidence suggests:
— Surveys offer a more representative view of service
performance and targeted research is being developed to clarify
emerging findings and test hypotheses and assumptions.
— Focus groups are very effective in gaining a real
life sense check of existing/new customer issues, and obtaining
in-depth feedback.
— Response cards provide a biased view of services
due to the motivating factor to provide a response leading from
customer delight or disappointment.
— Website mechanism is only currently an address
on a "Contact Us" web page, therefore ineffective.
— Analysis of complaints provides clear insight
into which processes require review to improve customer experience
of the department.
Our complaints and compliments process provides us with useful
feedback to enable us to improve our service/performance. This
process is easily accessible to users and the system audited by
the Complaints Audit Committee which also provides recommendations
in its annual report.
Background
[There are many ways in which a customer can lodge their
complaint—email, letter, fax. They can phone the advice
line for advice on how to complain. This information is all available
on the IND website and in the leaflets that are available in all
public areas. All these systems working together are effective
in communicating how to complain.
In 2006—IND CFT dealt with 7,386 telephone calls and
14,347 letters.
MPs wrote 41,542 letters on immigration and asylum issues
in 2006, of which 14,044 were written to Ministers and 27,498
to IND. The majority of these letters are asking for an update
on a constituent's status, or advising IND of a change in circumstance
or need to travel, or challenging government policy. They are
not therefore regarded as complaints although we do take note
of any specific mention by MPs within the letters, of unnecessary
delays or failure by IND to carry out actions previously promised.]
4. Can you identify any changes made as a result of gathering
user feedback?
Indirectly based on user feedback, a Complaints Change Programme
is underway to deliver improvements in complaint handling, over
the next 12 months. The Complaints Change Programme will overhaul
and significantly improve complaints handling across the business.
This includes:
— A new approach to defining and categorising complaints,
to take better account of their weight and impact.
— New streamlined processes for handling and responding
to complaints.
— A new database to capture and monitor all complaints,
and to allow us to analyse trends and patterns and feed them back
to the business to promote service improvement.
— New comprehensive guidance to staff on complaints
handling.
Improvements to Enforcement and Removals Directorate activity
mean that:
— Since September 2006, very serious complaints
have been handled in accordance with a CAC recommendation, mirroring
Police practice.
— More use will now be made of Informal Resolution
to resolve minor complaints.
In UKvisas, feedback has been used to design a more comprehensive
approach to performance management and business planning.
In Managed Migration, the first wave of the customer survey
was presented in December 2006. Recommendations specific to process
issues such as forms and guidance, loss of documents, to customer
communications are being used by business teams to improve service
offered. Other processes which have been identified for review
include acknowledgment of applications, acknowledgement of applications,
and service to UKvisas. We have recently conducted extensive surveys
on services, entitlements and price ahead of a new pricing regime.
The cost of the market research is £150k. Separate research
has also been undertaken by UKvisas costing £200k.
5. If you undertake user surveys how often are they repeated,
and how much is spent on each survey?
A copy of the on-going complainant's survey is sent to every
customer who has made a formal complaint. A reminder is sent if
there is no response within six weeks. The cost is not separately
identified.
The UKvisas user survey will be run every quarter. It was
designed in-house, and is printed locally with all results collated
locally. The only costs are for local printing and staff time.
Managed Migration will be operating a twice yearly survey
of its customers for the next two years. Each survey costs approximately
£25,000 to complete and debrief to business managers. Some
local surveys are also undertaken which have no direct cost.
6. What targets for customer service, if any, are in place?
In common with other areas of Government, IND and UKvisas
are subject to published targets in dealing with a range of correspondence.
Managed Migration customer service standards are set out
in the following chart:
| Managed Migration Customer Service Standards |
| Turnaround Target Summary – General Group |
| 70% of charged applications with an initial decision within 20 working days. |
| 90% of charged applications with an initial decision within 70 working days. |
| 98% of Charged PEO cases in 24 hours from Oct.04. |
| 25% of non-charged applications with an initial decision within 20 working days. |
| 30% of non-charged applications with an initial decision within 70 working days. |
| 95% of non-charged PEO cases decided within 24 hours. |
| 70% of Travel documents with a decision within 20 working days. |
| 90% of Travel documents with a decision within 70 working days. |
| Turnaround Target Summary - Work Permits |
| Decisions on WP (CB+SB) 70% of all applications within 5 working days. |
| Decisions on WP (CB+SB) 90% of all applications within 15 working days. |
| Immigration decisions on 70% of In-Country work permit applications, within 20 working days of
receipt. |
| Decisions on 90% of In-Country work permit applications, within 45 working days of receipt |
| Decisions on 50% of all HSMP applications within 25 working days. |
| Decisions on 90% of all HSMP applications within 70 working days. |
| Decisions on 90% of requests for work cards from SAWS Operators within 5 working days |
| Decision on 70% of Worker Registration Scheme applications within 10 working days. |
| Decision on 90% of Worker Registration Scheme applications within 20 working days. |
| Turnaround Target Summary - Nationality |
| Decisions on 60% of Nationality applications within 3 months. |
| Decisions on 80% of Nationality applications within 6 months. |
| Decisions on 90% of Nationality applications within 12 months. |
Formal complaints have a completion date of eight weeks.
Operational Complaints have a completion date of four weeks. IND's
Complaints Change programme will address the need to improve performance
in this area which has been criticised by the Complaints Audit
Committee.
7. Do you have a complaint handling unit, or are complaints
handled where they are received?
The Customer Focus Team (CFT) is the central unit for handling
Immigration and Nationality Directorate complaints. The CFT send
formal complaints out to the business to investigate and quality
assure the replies. Service delivery complaints are forwarded
to the relevant business areas to complete.
Dedicated resources are also in place in the Enforcement
and Removals Directorate and in Asylum Casework.
8. How many full time equivalents are involved in complaint
handling, and at what grades?
In the IND Customer Focus Team there is 1 Grade 7, 4 SEOs,
4 HEOs, 7.5 EOs, 9.5 AOs and 1 AA involved with complaint handling.
In the Enforcement and Removals Directorate (at present)
there is 1 G7 and 1 HEO who deal with complaints on a full time
basis.
In Asylum casework, there is one full time HEO, who works
solely on investigating formal complaints.
There are also 324 full-time equivalent members of staff
involved in the drafting and administrative processes relating
to MPs correspondence.
IND is developing a customer focus strategy to ensure the
services we deliver—the information, processes and actions—reflect
customer needs and are focussed on customer outcomes. We need
to ensure our services are accessible, prompt, high quality, fair
to all, and transparent, and that we manage customer expectations.
We plan to make full use of the move to agency status and regional
delivery of services to achieve this.
As set out in response to Question 4, we have in hand a significant
change programme to improve complaints handling across IND, so
that we respond to complaints swiftly, effectively, and proportionately,
and learn the lessons to improve our service.
9. Do you have an internal review process for dealing
with complaints? If so, how does it operate?
The IND Customer Focus Team (CFT) acts as a central point
of contact for complaints. The Unit logs and allocates both formal
and operational complaints to business areas for response. The
target for investigation and response to formal complaints is
eight weeks and four weeks for operational complaints. The Unit
records completion times for both types of complaint and produces
monthly performance reports.
IND categorises its complaints into two categories. Formal
investigations or as referred to in IND "formal complaints",
are about the conduct of an individual member of IND staff, for
example where a member of the public considers that staff have
been inefficient, rude, discriminatory or unprofessional. The
other category is operational complaints, these relate to service
delivery.
10. Do you do any analysis of complaints to inform service
delivery and design?
The IND Customer Focus Team shares information with individual
business units, who then use it to shape their future plans. However,
under new procedures being developed the role within this team
will expand to include facilitating analysis from the centre.
Within the Enforcement and Removals Directorate, at the end
of each investigation the Complaints team make recommendations
locally where concerns are identified. In doing so, it aims to
identify and rectify weakness in our internal processes and procedures.
The intention being, that where serious risks and flaws in practice
are uncovered, they are flagged up nationally. This feed back
loop will be achieved by a periodic report to the senior management
of ERD of those issues uncovered. This is a relatively new initiative,
for operational matters, it does not extend to our casework.
As the internal review process has not long been established,
the feedback loop will take time to directly influence presence
system. The Developing Enforcement Capability Programme responsible
for creating many of the systems that are to be used in the future,
work in hand with the existing complaints function and the CAC.
This is most evident in establishing the pilot of Informal Resolution
and work towards involving the Independent Police Complaints Commission
in the operational arm of ERD and analogous arrangements for Scotland
and Northern Ireland.
Managed Migration analyse the complaints that are received
within their area. This analysis is then reviewed by central MM
Customer Service to identify key issues and trends.
February 2007
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