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

Results from the National Customer Satisfaction Survey 2021 giving a summary of local authority performance of the National Performance Framework.

Part of

• Building standards: verification and certification
• Building standards

1. Executive Summary

1.1. Executive Summary

1. The remit of the building standards system in Scotland is to protect the public interest by setting out the standards to be met when building or conversion work takes place, to the extent necessary to meet the building regulations.

2. In 2021, the Scottish Government commissioned Pye Tait Consulting to undertake the eighth annual national customer satisfaction survey for building standards. [1] The purpose of the annual survey is to obtain nationally consistent customer satisfaction data across all 32 local authorities in Scotland and to enable comparison analysis between years.

3. The survey aligns with Key Performance Outcome 4 ( KPO4 ) of the 'Building Standards Performance Framework for Verifiers' (operational from May 2017). [2] The purpose of KPO4 – titled 'Understand and respond to the customer experience' – is for local authority verifiers to monitor customer satisfaction with the building standards service and ensure it meets or exceeds customer expectations.

1.2. Approach to delivering the survey:

• The 2021 survey questionnaire was slightly shortened compared to the 2020 version (a copy is presented in Appendix 2) to remove some questions no longer fit-for-purpose and to boost response rates. Some small changes were also made to reflect that work is undertaken virtually due to Covid-19.
• The scope of the survey was all building standards customers between 1st April 2020 and 31st March 2021, defined as:
  • Applicants for building warrants (including any agents);
  • Submitters of completion certificates (including any agents); and
  • Others that have interacted with the building standards service.

  1.3. Achieved sample:

  • Total email addresses supplied to Pye Tait from local authorities: 27,519[3]
  • Total survey invitation emails sent by Pye Tait: 22,493[4]
  • Total survey responses received: 3,259
  • Response rate: 14.5%[5] (against 22,493 emails sent).

  1.4. Respondent profile:

  • The majority of surveyed customers (72%) stated that they were direct building warrant applicants and/or direct submitters of completion certificates during the 2020/21 financial year (the period in scope of the survey).
  • A fifth (19%) classified themselves as agents, i.e. acting on behalf of applicants.
  • A small minority (7%) classified themselves as both agents and applicants, while 2% defined themselves as an 'other' customer type.
  • The majority of customers (80%) had submitted applications for domestic work only, 10% submitted applications for non-domestic work only and 11% submitted applications for both domestic and non-domestic work.
  Table 1.4.a 2021 headline results and comparisons

  Key	Numerical rating questions	Percentage questions
  Green (G)	7.5 and higher	75% and higher
  Amber (A)	Between 6.5 and 7.4	Between 65% and 74%
  Red (R)	6.4 and below	64% and below

  Note that the colour-coding metrics used reflect The Scottish Government's updated performance measurement requirements.

  Scotland	Scotland 2021	Scotland 2020	Scotland 2019
  Overall Satisfaction
  Overall satisfaction with the service (score out of 10)	7.1 (A)	7.5 (G)	7.4 (A)
  Extent to which service met expectations (score out of 10)	7.2 (A)	7.5 (G)	7.4 (A)
  Very/fairly satisfied with the timeliness of various aspects of the service	54% (R)	58% (R)	60% (R)
  Kept very/fairly well informed about the progress of an application or submission	59% (R)	61% (R)	61% (R)
  Strongly agree/agree to some extent that sufficient advice and guidance was received to meet needs	63% (R)	67% (A)	69% (A)
  Strongly agree/agree to some extent that building standards service staff were polite and courteous	80% (G)	82% (G)	84% (G)
  Very/fairly satisfied with the quality of the advice and guidance received from inspection staff	60% (R)	55% (R)	77% (G)
  Satisfied with the accuracy of written information (score out of 10)	7.9 (G)	8.1 (G)	8.1 (G)
  Satisfied with the quality of written information (score out of 10)	7.8 (G)	8.0 (G)	8.0 (G)
  Building standards service staff are accessible if I want to meet them in person	48% (R)	51% (R)	59% (R)
  Building standards service staff are approachable	66% (A)	72% (A)	74% (A)

  Source Pye Tait Consulting, 2021