House of Commons Stakeholder Research - Quantitative and Qualitative

In January 2007, FDS were commissioned by the House of Commons Service (providers of IT services, catering, security, financial and other advice to Members of Parliament and their staff) to obtain feedback on the range and quality of services they deliver.

The main role of the House of Commons Service is to "enable the House and its Members to perform their parliamentary duties effectively" by providing advice and services which support them in their role. The purpose of this research was to gain an overview of customer satisfaction in each area of the Service.

MPs and their staff surely epitomise the profile of 'hard to reach' and 'time starved' respondents and, therefore, FDS recommended the adoption of a mixed mode data collection approach, utilising online, postal and telephone data collection methodologies in order to maximise response rates from a quantitative survey sent out to every MP and their staff. In addition, there was a programme of telephone and email reminders, the content and timing of which was agreed with the House Service.

The survey was undertaken in March 2007, and the House Service was very satisfied with the response rates achieved (an overall return of 52%) for both MPs and their staff. The survey and analysis were completed on time and to budget.

The results of the quantitative phase were put before the House of Commons Commission and have now been published online at this address:

http://www.parliament.uk/surveyofservices/

The House Service used the results of the survey to feed into an 'action plan' designed to ensure that customer feedback was properly noted and actioned. Results were also used as part of a wide-ranging review of the management and services of the House.

As a follow up, FDS also conducted a series of qualitative depth interviews with 10 MPs and 14 staff to gather more in-depth feedback on two of the house services.