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	Customer Satisfaction Initiative Department of Education Publications Center	The ED Pubs story

The U.S. Department of Education Publications Center (ED Pubs) recently received its second set of scores on the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) survey. The Department will use the survey results to improve customer service.

About the Survey

Who was surveyed?

Parents, teachers, administrators, and business and community organizations who ordered education publications, videos, CDs, posters, and bookmarks.

Since the project's inception, ED Pubs has received over 400,000 telephone calls and over 350,000 electronic requests. During this time, over 225 million products have been shipped to customers.

What were they asked?

The survey asked about the usefulness and readability of the products, the ease of ordering, timeliness of delivery, and courtesy and professionalism of the ED Pubs staff.

Survey Results

What was the score from the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI)?

The U.S. Department of Education Publications Center remains highly rated in all three of its activities--ordering process, customer loyalty, and information products--having received an outstanding score of 79 from the ACSI survey. This is roughly 8 points higher than the current national ACSI score for private sector services and is higher than all but the very best among private sector service providers. A 79 is an exceptional score for a service provider.

This year's score of 79 is an insignificant drop from the preceding 1999 score of 80. Only index score differences 3 points or greater are statistically significant at the 95 percent level.

The Ordering Process has experienced a statistically significant 3-point decline from a year ago, largely attributable to a lower rating on ease of ordering (8.7 down from 9.0) and should be the focus for improvement.

The Department's quality products and exceptional product delivery are reflected in the outstanding Customer Loyalty score of 87. The index of Customer Loyalty remains unchanged from last year's results. Customer Loyalty is even more impressive given the customer base has more than doubled this year from 205,000 to 514,000 customers representing more than a 140 percent increase.

The Information Products scored 2 points higher than in 1999, from 84 percent in 1999 up to 86 percent in 2000. Our customers are telling us they value our products and appreciate the delivery service.

What customer service activities were done well?

For all measured activities, the Education Publications Center received outstanding customer satisfaction ratings, including product quality, timeliness of delivery, and staff courtesy and professionalism.

What needs improvement?

Improvement efforts should be directed toward ease of ordering, more specifically the online ordering process.

What activities are planned to improve customer satisfaction?

American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) Continuous Improvement Plan for ED Pubs

As part of its continuous improvement plan, ED Pubs management conducts an ongoing separate, in-depth customer satisfaction survey. The two primary measured areas for the ED Pubs survey are similar to the ACSI measured areas: customer service and quality of information products. Like the ACSI results, the ED Pubs survey received very positive results.

New Service Improvements

ED Pubs continually seeks ways to enhance customer service. The most recent enhancements include:

• Backorder procedures were revised so that customers would only have orders pending for products that ED staff confirmed were being printed. In addition, the ED Pubs referral list was continually updated.

• Customer Service Representatives have access to all available shipment tracking information for orders in transit, which allows them to provide more complete order status information to customers.

• The state-of-the-art ED Pubs order processing system enables Customer Service Representatives to send customers a link to a publication's URL via e-mail by simply clicking on the URL and entering in the customer's address.

• The number of Hispanic Customer Service Representatives was increased to further enable the ED Pubs staff to more efficiently respond to the growing response from the Hispanic community.

• Print-On-Demand service was developed to help ensure copies of publications could be made available to all requesters.

What other information is available about customer satisfaction?

• U.S. Department of Education http://www.ed.gov/
• Department of Education Strategic Plan http://www.ed.gov/pubs/stratplan2001-05/index.html

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This page last modified June 12, 2003 (jer)