Workshop of « Best practices exchanges » Luxembourg 14-15 February 2011 Support centre performance evaluation Anonymous user test: Winter 2010/2011 Telephone service Norbert REINERT Central Support Team

Anonymous Test report index: Objectives of this “Anonymous Test” Request Evaluation Results Major findings and recommendations

Anonymous Test – General Objectives Detect weaknesses in the process and the quality of the user support service network To invite these centres to reflect on the improvement of their processes and the quality aspects

Anonymous Test – Specific Objectives 20 support centres – Croatian & Turkish not tested Phone call in order to check - availability of the service and also - quality of the reply given Simple request easy to find with search function of Eurostat's website. Weighting of the different evaluated points .

Anonymous Test – Expectations Comparativeness of results Measure of good quality - 2/3 of the overall points and - at least 20/50 points for the quality evaluation. Improvement suggestions requested - Support centres with less than 20 points on the quality item

Request “Dear Sir or Madam, I have a question regarding prisoners: Where can I find the number of prisoners in the EU ?”

Evaluation Service Points Total Service 25 Reply Total Reply Quality Introduction on reply/answer in Eurostat’s name 15 Promotion of Eurostat 5 Invite user to come back Total Service 25 Reply First call availability or possibility to leave a message or offer to call back 20 Reply in given language Total Reply Quality Database Explanation how to extract data Explanations on registration, personalised data tree, benchmarking Comparisions Methological notes Publications (SIF 36/2009) 10 Metadata Total Quality 50 TOTAL OF ALL 100

Results (1) Minimum Median Maximum reached Service (25 points) 5 25 5 25 Reply (25 points) Quality (50 points) 17,5 40

Nr of SC less than 5 points Results (2) Nr of SC less than 5 points Nr of SC Service (25 points) 5 Reply (25 points) 1 Quality (50 points): Less than 20 points 10 20 - 30 points 6 More than 30 points 4

Results - total Total Nr of support centres (max 100 points) Less than 30 points 4 30-60 points 8 More than 60 points

Major findings Two support centres showed the search function Two support centres collected statistics on the caller Five support centres requested the user to submit a written request Five support centres called back/asked user to call back None of the support centres indicated Statistics Explained as a source

Recommendations (Quality) Cover all points raised in the request as completely as possible Use language of the request to answer the user Consult Eurostat Central support when complex request cannot be answered

Recommendations (Service) Answer in the name of Eurostat Promote European statistics (replies could be completed with general or specific information about Eurostat and its products) Invite user to come back if more help needed

General recommendations Links to Eurostat’s homepage Integration of or links to major tables Integration of/or links to news releases and publications Links to support centre(s)