Telephone response rates - update report

Report: 8
Date: 17 May 2007
By: Assistant Commissioner Operational Services on behalf of the Commissioner

Summary

This report provides an update on response rates in relation to answering emergency and non-emergency calls from the public. It highlights how response times impact upon citizen focus and satisfaction rates and the work that is being done to improve our performance in this area.

A. Recommendation

That members note the report.

B. Supporting information

1. Operational Services (OS) has an aim to put the citizen at the heart of everything it does and to improve service delivery. OS leads on behalf of the MPS on Diversity and Citizen Focus and contains the Central Communications Command (CCC), which is the operational creation of the C3i Programme. CCC currently handles around 12 million telephone calls per year, many of them from the public and provides command and control for incidents arising out the calls from the public. By the 12 July 2007 there will be only four more boroughs (Waltham Forest, Redbridge, Kingston and Richmond) to join CCC and the transitions of boroughs into CCC will be completed by the end of September 2007.

2. The MPS has a number of projects currently being developed that will either directly or indirectly improve access to our services via the telephone. These include: the roll out of the C3i Programme including the move of the switchboards (or Telephone Operating Centres) into CCC, the front counter programme, the development of contact numbers on the MPS internet site and consideration of a planned non-emergency number for London.

Performance

3. From April 2006 the MPS adopted the National Call Handling Standards. These standards introduced a revised target for answering both emergency and non-emergency calls. For emergency calls the target we are working towards is to answer 90% of calls within 10 seconds. For non-emergency calls the target is 90% within 30 seconds.

4. For the year 2006/07 we averaged over 6200 emergency calls per day. We answered 82% of those calls within 10 seconds. Although we were operating to a different standard the previous year, our performance compares favourably with that of the previous year. The volume of calls showed an increase of 7% on 2005/06.

5. There are a number of reasons for this increase including changes brought about by technology, making it easier to identify all emergency calls. Some of the extra volume may have been caused by callers not having their call answered quick enough and ringing back whilst others were made when units responding to the original call did not arrive quickly enough, causing the person to make another call.

6. As more boroughs join CCC the volume of non-emergency calls continues to rise. For the year 2006/07 CCC answered on average 71% of calls within 30 seconds.

7. In April 2006 the MPS averaged 1850 non-emergency calls per day. By March 2007 this had increased to 4050. Taking in to account the volume of calls yet to join CCC, it is anticipated that the average daily volume of non-emergency calls will be around 5,500.

Appendix 1 shows two charts showing our performance since April 2005 in answering both emergency and non-emergency calls.

8. Call handling can be subject to a scientific calculation linking call handling to demand (Erlang). The number of people working within CCC and their deployment is obviously critical, particularly at periods of high demand (e.g. summer) and individual busy days (e.g. Halloween). CCC are currently taking steps to increase the efficiency / productivity rates of their staff. A pool of trained staff are still being utilised (in Information Room) to assist with periods of increased demand. The use of these resources will be reassessed once the transition of all Boroughs into CCC has been completed.

Customer satisfaction

9. A key work stream of Citizen Focus is ‘Improving the User Experience’. There are key elements within this area that will contribute to improvement in Citizen Focus and allow us to deliver a high quality and professional service. These include:

• Ease of contacting the police
• Achieving target response times
• Dealing with initial enquiries
• Obtaining and responding to feedback.

10. The centralisation of the majority of call handling within CCC will lead to standard practices being adopted for all emergency and non-emergency calls. This will lead to an improved service to victims and other people contacting the MPS. The MPS currently experiences high levels of satisfaction with access to our services by telephone (see below) and it is hoped that the development of the initiatives will increase satisfaction still further.

11. To understand satisfaction levels with accessibility to our services the Citizen Focus Programme uses direct feedback from surveys conducted with both crime victims and callers about anti-social behaviour.

12. Each survey randomly samples 18,000 crime victims (CVS) and 18,000 callers about anti-social behaviour each year. These are independently conducted surveys and the Home Office uses the crime victim results to assist assessment of the MPS within the Police Performance Assessment Framework.

13. The situation at present is illustrated by the data included with this report from the survey results. The data in the CVS is the result of some 36, 000 calls made by crime victims to emergency and non-emergency numbers for performance years 2005 – 2006 and 2006 to 2007. The ASB data is for performance year 2006/07 and details the satisfaction levels of some 18,000 callers over that year.

14. Again views upon what could be done to improve are presented. ‘Answer the phone quicker’ remains a view from 3% of the sample, ‘answer the phone’ – as a comment – has declined as a concern by 1% of the sample. This would be reflecting the improvements made by CCC over the year.

15. ASB 2006 – 2007

• 94% of all calls regarding anti-social behaviour were made by telephone.
• Of those using the emergency number 91% were satisfied that they were dealt with in a reasonable time.
• The satisfaction level of callers using the non-emergency number was at 85%.
• Some 15% had concerns about the time taken to answer the telephone with would equate to 2700 people out of a sample of 18,000.

The issues of concern are again listed and these are matters being addressed by the Central Communications Command.

16. CCC also actively seeks feedback from its external customers in the shape of the First Contact Survey. It has 2 key purposes. The first purpose is to measure customer satisfaction. This is done via an online questionnaire. There are 13 select questions to which customers select an answer. The values assigned to the answers populate an excel database from which levels of satisfaction can be drawn. In this respect the survey is similar to both the Crime Victim Survey and the Anti Social Behaviour Survey. Questions are similar and data returns compatible because we use the same array of possible answers. CCC has ensured that there is no overlap of potential survey customers.

17. The second purpose is to gauge how customers think the service could be improved. The 14th and final survey question invites the customer to suggest how the service could have been improved. The customers’ freetext responses are analysed manually.

18. Last year we sought feedback from 24,000 people. In response over 1,700 people completed the on line questionnaire:

• Overall, 73% of those surveyed expressed satisfaction with their first contact.
• Of those that gave an opinion, 78% expressed satisfaction.
• On matters relating to efficiency & professionalism, 70% expressed satisfaction.
• On matters relating to customer care and attention, 83% expressed satisfaction.

19. The 4 most frequently cited areas where customers felt we could improve our (telephone) service were:

• Letting them know what happened after their call - 92 comments
• By deploying officers to the scene - 76 comments
• Keeping them informed during the call - 64 comments
• Show more interest - 61 comments

20. CCC as part of their Aspire Project have introduced 11 quality standards for their people who take telephone calls. These are based on the National Call Handling Standards. The standards include establishing the callers’ needs, establishing a rapport, empathy and managing expectations. Supervisors are required to check calls taken by their staff against these standards and give appropriate feedback.

Single non-emergency number

21. The introduction of a single non-emergency number continues to have value for the MPS. It has been introduced in a number of forces across the country. However the national project, which the MPS was supporting, has been temporarily halted, whilst the learning from the pilot sites is analysed. Exploratory work has taken place within London to setting up a single number for London.

Call blending

22. One of the remaining pieces of work yet to be delivered by the C3i programme is call blending. This would allow operators in CCC to receive and deal with communication from the public by email and other web based media. Funding for the project has already been secured and the requirements of the functionality are currently being identified. It is likely that this will not be delivered as part of the C3i programme and work has begun to transfer the ownership to Directorate of Information.

Language Line

23. Language Line is a telephone interpreting service, available 24hrs a day, offering over 100 languages. CCC makes good use of this service. In April 2007 1357 calls were made to Language Line. This is the highest call volume in the last 12 months. For the last 11 months - May 2006 to March 2007, the call volumes ranged from 1061 to 1192:

• 697 (67%) of these calls were ‘R’ graded
• 180 (17%) were ‘I’ graded
• 113 (11%) were ‘S’ graded calls.

24. 80% of the calls were answered in less than 15 seconds and 92% of these were connected to an interpreter within 25 seconds. This is down 5% on last month and 4% lower than the previous financial year’s average.

25. The top ten users for April are Polish, Turkish, Punjabi, Spanish, Bengali, Portuguese, Somali, Russian, French and Tamil. These remain unchanged from the previous month. However the first three mentioned remain the top users of the service. Call volume for the top ten users for April was very similar to the month of March, as were the average call duration times.

26. Over the last 12 months, the Polish community have been the top users – their usage is more than twice the amount of the Turkish community, which are the second top users of the language Line service. However, almost 50% of Polish calls do not show the borough where the call originated. Work has begun to address this.

Non-urgent calls

27. Last year there were 4.5 million non-urgent calls to the MPS using the public numbers. The point of receipt for this type of call is the switchboard or Telephone Operating Centre.

28. The model developed by the C3i Programme was for as many enquiries as possible to be dealt with by other means other than a telephone call. The approach is for the MPS external web site and other corporate and bespoke databases to address enquiries at first point of contact rather than to deflect callers elsewhere in the MPS (including local police stations).

29. Where the most appropriate resolution of a non-urgent call is to connect to a borough based or local policing unit the call handler will attempt to identify the most appropriate unit, team or officer and transfer the call. If the call is not answered on the first attempt to transfer, then the caller will be offered the option of either the direct dial number or transfer to a voicemail number for the unit concerned to enable a message to be left.

30. As part of the C3i rollout each BOCU is required to set up 28 voicemail inboxes intended to cover all areas of the BOCU. Included within these is a ‘default’ number nominated by the BOCU to allow placement of messages where the operator is unable to identify the appropriate unit to deal. These numbers could include those for the Crime Management Unit, Community Safety Unit and Witness Care Unit.

31. Previously, when an enquiry did not fit neatly into a particular area call handlers often directed calls to station offices. Boroughs will only resource a front counter to deal with personal callers. Answering the telephone is a secondary priority to that. As the peak demands for both type of enquiry tend to coincide, telephone callers will seldom get an acceptable response and when front office staff did have capacity to clear voicemail it was at unsociable times that often meant a return call was inappropriate. For these reasons no voicemail inboxes have been put on the front counter telephones.

32. Voicemail rollout is due to complete in September 2007 when Richmond and Kingston join CCC. Post September 2007, it is anticipated that the MPS performance in this area will greatly improve and members of the public will be able to ring a police station and speak to the right person or be able to leave a message that will receive an appropriate response.

33. A further development for contacting the MPS is the ability for people to contact their Safer Neighbourhood Team. Members of the public can call direct on a landline number that diverts to the team’s mobile ‘mobex’ ‘phone if the office is not staffed. The call to the mobile is connected at the normal landline cost. If no officer from a specified team is available, non-urgent messages can be left on their voicemail and will be responded to the next time that a member of that team is on duty.

Challenges ahead

34. There are a number of challenges ahead. Later this year CCC will have over 2000 members of staff making it the largest OCU within the MPS (it will be bigger than a number of county police forces). Police officers and staff are being introduced to standardised operating procedures to deal with telephone calls and the deployment of police resources. People are also being recruited directly into CCC without having worked for the MPS previously. The challenge here is to create a single team clearly focused on delivering the best possible service for London.

35. Secondly there are cultural and technological issues involved in CCC becoming a fully functioning operational command unit. Work is continuing to ensure that CCC is capable of dealing with increasing demand for police services. This will involve living within its means as an OCU and taking on the full extent and demands as described by the C3i Programme. Once aligned, CCC is still likely to still face operational challenges in handling fluctuations in demand (i.e. the summer months).

36. Thirdly, technology plays a vital role within CCC. New systems are currently being developed in line with the C3i Programme Business Case and these will be introduced in to CCC when they are meet the operational requirements.

37. Answering the telephone call is only part of what should be seen as an end-to-end process. The other part of the process involves despatching an officer to the scene to deal with the incident effectively. CCC is working with Territorial Policing on a joint initiative called Responding Safely Together. This project ensures that key parts of the MPS, in terms of response policing, are working together. It establishes what the responsibilities are of CCC and their operational colleagues on the 32 London Boroughs. Overall it aims to clarify operational leadership, supervision and incident resolution. The challenge ahead is to ensure the effectiveness of this initiative so that it delivers the best possible service to London.

C. Race and equality impact

CCC will continue to explore why different communities contact the police by telephone and identify solutions to any barriers identified. Information will be collected from the use of Language Line, from feedback obtained from the various surveys detailed above and from its own Independent Advisory Group.

D. Financial implications

There are no other financial implications outside those that the C3i Programme currently report on to the MPA.

E. Background papers

None

F. Contact details

Report author: Mark Sheeran, Chief Inspector, Performance & Development Manager, Central Communications Command, MPS.

For more information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

Appendix 2

Crime Victim Survey 2005/06 & 2006/07 and Anti Social Behaviour Survey 2006/07

Crime Victim Survey 2005/06

Crime Victim Survey 2006/07

Anti Social Behaviour Survey 2006/07

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