Building Standards verification performance framework - national customer satisfaction survey: survey findings 2021

10. Conclusions and findings

10.1. Conclusions

1. The eighth annual national survey of building standards customers in Scotland has achieved a respectable overall response rate of 15% and has successfully captured the views of different types of customers served by all 32 local authorities. The highest overall volume of customer email addresses was supplied by local authorities in 2021 compared to previous years. The survey was once again promoted via social media channels, resulting in the highest number of responses to date since the first survey was run.

2. Across several headline measures, customer satisfaction with the building standards service has fallen in Scotland over the past year, with the overall score standing at 7.1 out of 10, compared with 7.5 in 2020. Direct applicants are slightly more satisfied than agents, although the gap between the two remains close (7.2 and 7.0, respectively).

3. Over the years since the survey began, customer expectations of the service have not generally changed, with the most important aspects being speed of response, efficiency and clarity of communications, ease of access to friendly and knowledgeable staff, as well as consistency in the quality of service within and between local authorities.

4. Most customers are generally complimentary about the service, either experiencing no issues or the satisfactory resolution of any queries or problems arising over the course of an application. However, it seems clear from the feedback that customers' emails, phone calls and voice messages are not always being answered in what they perceive as a reasonable timeframe, and that the length of time taken by local authorities to process building warrant applications (including cases that some agents consider to be 'straightforward') is often beyond what customers deem acceptable. This is a particular problem where delays can have a knock-on impact on applicants' plans and/or wider development activity. This has been a recurring issue within customer feedback for several years now, and suggests that customer expectations could be managed more effectively. This concern has been further compounded by the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, although some customers were genuinely sympathetic to the extra pressures on local authorities and felt that verifiers had done their best.

5. The necessary switch to remote working has meant that volumes of inspections and site visits remain lower than pre-Covid-19 levels, and there is extensive use of electronic communication and inspection. There appears to be split opinion over whether this transition to remote working is working to the benefit or detriment of customers, with some favouring this approach, and others preferring face-to-face resolution. Customers are broadly understanding that processes may take longer than normal with staff based at home, and most are familiar with communication with building standards over email or through the portal. However, some customers note that not all issues are resolved timeously and express frustration that building standards teams have not yet fully adapted to remote working to be able to provide responses in an adequate timeframe. Overall, there is decreasing satisfaction with timeliness of responses and extent to which services met customer expectations.

6. A minority of customers are concerned that the level of service provided by their local authority is not sufficiently customer-focused and they largely put this down to under-resourcing.

7. Customers also commented that staff should be more understanding of their needs and offer greater levels of guidance and support when required as they move through what can be a stressful process. Customers request improved clarity and guidance on the process as a whole (and associated terminology) to promote a more supportive journey for them. This suggests that the existing Customer Journey^[14] document may not be sufficiently visible through local authorities.

8. Disparities prevail between different local authority verifiers and satisfaction levels are lowest among customers of the largest local authorities (see Appendix 1).

9. Finally, customer feedback on the eBuilding Standards system suggests that the portal would benefit from continuous review and development to incorporate the latest technology available. Customers believe this will ensure it is simple and intuitive to use, particularly if accompanied by guidance for customers who are less IT-literate, and if portal traffic has increased due to Covid-19.

10.2. Forward Considerations

1. These considerations are for the Scottish Government (Building Standards Division) to consider taking forward in conjunction with Local authority Building Standards Scotland (LABSS) and Building Standards Managers (BSMs) across the 32 local authority verifiers and are based on customer feedback and suggestions to this survey.

2. Additionally, the separate individual local authority verifier reports (x32) will help to pinpoint where customer service performance is relatively strong or weak.

3. The results enable customer satisfaction performance to be measured against the previous year, as well as future years, in the interests of continuous improvement. Any proposed mechanisms for improving customer service would need to be considered in relation to local authority verifier resources, which have been placed under additional strain in 2020 due to Covid-19.

4. It is important to ensure that service levels can meet changing customer needs and expectations in the face of new technologies (including eBuilding Standards) and the potential for lasting changes to the way local authorities work due to Covid-19. It is also important that remote working does not lead to customers being (or feeling) unable to reach building standards teams and that, if contact channels or response times have changed on a lasting basis, customers' expectations are managed. This means being clear on what customers can actually expect rather than general statements that there may be delays where customers do not know when they might get a response to a query.

5. On the back of the 2021 findings, it would appear that customer satisfaction and associated measures have fallen after a rise over the past few years, and that ongoing work is required to reverse this trend. Specific considerations for improving the customer experience are broadly similar to 2020 and continue to apply as guiding principles for improvement and embedding change.

• Identify ways of reducing the time taken for processing building warrant applications and completion certificates, particularly with staff adapting to new ways of working.
• Whilst it may not always be possible to keep customers regularly updated on the progress of their application, ensure that customer email and telephone queries are responded to (with more than an auto-reply acknowledgement) within an acceptable period of time (i.e. those stated in local authorities' customer charters).
• Proactively manage customer expectations around response timescales from the outset. Clear explanations should be provided to customers as to why applications may need to take a particular length of time, including reasons for any envisaged delay to services.
• Where customer feedback points to concerns that a local authority verifier service is not meeting customer expectations, use this evidence to make a business case to senior Council leaders for more and better resourcing.
• Continue to explore and identify best practices among those local authority verifiers with higher overall satisfaction scores. Consider what opportunities exist and what challenges need to be overcome to share best practices and embed these more widely across Scotland.
• Ensure that where building standards staff members change (or are absent for any reason), contingency procedures are in place to pick up cases or that there is a handover so that delays are minimised.
• Maintain local ownership for improving the customer experience through effective use of Continuous Improvement Plans (CIPs) and updating local customer charters.
• Continue to identify ways of working smarter and to ensure processes set out in legislation can be enacted with optimum efficiency.
• Customers note their experience could be improved if the functionality of the eDev (eBS) portal is developed to provide step-by-step guidance and a more efficient and intuitive experience, as well as ensuring that local authority verifiers use the system to its full advantage. Customers' suggested system and process enhancements include allowing the upload of multiple drawings at once and — ideally — enabling customers to log in and check on the progress of an application, as well as the use of plain English.

6. Binding these considerations together is the need for a customer-focused approach to be at the heart of all behaviour, and for this to be embedded through continuous improvement.

7. The current methodology has successfully captured the views of thousands of building standards customers to provide accurate and robust data on customer satisfaction. However, as outlined in section 2.3, the Scottish Government commissioned Pye Tait Consulting to identify and propose a preferred model which the Scottish Government (Building Standards Division) could use to deliver the national customer survey for building standards.^[15] The future model that was proposed as the preferred option, and which has since been taken forwards for testing and piloting, is a short, sharp survey for customer to complete at one of two stages: at approval of building warrant, or acceptance of the completion certificate. The survey will be rolling/ongoing and comprise a short question set of six to ten questions with one open-text box for comments. This model will be used to evaluate customer satisfaction from 2022 onwards.

8. Some specific considerations relating to the delivery of this future national customer satisfaction survey for building standards can act as guiding principles as this model is developed. These also link into future considerations around the Performance Framework and the global coronavirus pandemic.

• Some local authority verifiers already operate their own satisfaction surveys on a local level. Consideration should be given as to whether these should be discontinued, to minimise duplication and potential confusion, so long as the national-level question set is specifically designed to meet the requirement of Customer Service Excellence (CSE) elements held by some verifiers. Such a question set should be designed to be quick and easy to complete, while retaining core questions for benchmarking purposes.
• Promotion of the survey should be carefully considered. Including the link to any online survey in any automated Building Warrant approval email (say) may be easily overlooked. To increase the visibility of the customer survey link, the opportunity to provide feedback could instead be circulated in a separate, dedicated and auto-generated message shortly afterwards.
• Response rates could be maintained or increased by incorporating the feedback process as part of the application cycle. Embedding any survey should be quick and simple and the benefits of completion clearly stated to respondents.
• The switch from an annual exercise to an ongoing one will reduce the potential for focused promotional activities such as blogs and social media posts. Embedding feedback as part of the application process would make this a moot point, but consideration should be given to how to raise awareness of the satisfaction survey.
• Consideration should be given to whether differing approaches are required for agents and applicants. While agents may become fatigued through surveying on a regular basis, there is a risk that not doing so may create a two-tier system that does not enable comparability between groups.
• As with the switch to any new system, the future model should be carefully developed, tested and piloted with small cohorts of verifiers and customers to iron out teething issues and ensure that it is fit-for-purpose.
• The eBuilding Standards portal provides an additional opportunity to maximise the volume and accuracy of customer details collected and held by local authority verifiers. With development, it could also standardise data capture to make national reporting easier, more efficient, and more accessible. Improved consistency in data standards across local authorities will help to promote consistency in customers' experience when liaising with different verifiers.