Impact Assessments
Improved change of circumstances and enquiries process (race) – August 2007
The objective is to improve the State Pension/Pension Credit change of circumstances and enquiries process as part of Pensions Transformation Programme (PTP).
The Main Activities:
- For changes in circumstance taken over the phone customers will not be required to send in written confirmation.
- Customers will only have to speak to one advisor to make an enquiry or report a change of circumstance.
- Customers and their representatives' communication needs will be pro-actively captured and retained on the Customer Account Management System where they make contact and we do not already hold this information.
- Customer advisors will be aware of previously requested language needs.
- Customers’ ethnicity information will be captured from customers, or representatives reporting a change of circumstances at Wave 2a where the information has not been captured or the 'form not completed' box is highlighted.
- The relevant data protection statement will be included in the Statement of Details (RM) or the form PC14.
- Informal representatives will be able to report changes as long as they answer security questions based on the customer data (unless they are reporting the death of the customer when the change will be taken even if they fail security questions).
- Written confirmation of the change and details of who reported it will be sent to the customer, unless the representative is reporting the death of the customer. In this case the letter will be sent to the person dealing with the estate or next of kin.
- We will not ask for the customer's signature on case reviews but simply issue a statement of details when the review is completed over the telephone.
- Incorporation of notes into form PC2 (65) which will make the form easier to follow and will be one less leaflet for the customer.
- The ethnicity screen will not be displayed when a customer reports a change if the data, or preference not to say is already held.
- Statement of Details (RM) will be issued for changes of circumstances reported.
Evidence and Consultation
PTP consulted customer representative groups involved in the Partnership Against Poverty and the DWP Policy and Strategy Forums, to obtain customer insight, and the conclusion is that there will be no adverse or disproportionate impact.
There will be a positive impact on ethnic minority customers as once their needs have been recorded any future contact will be handled automatically in the customer’s preferred language, and as such they will benefit from an improved customer experience. There will also be access to Management information showing customers’ ethnicity and be able to target specific customer groups to evaluate and improve our services to them.
Impact
This screening stage of an Impact Assessment has identified that there is no direct or indirect adverse impact upon ethnic minorities and that there is no evidence of any disproportionate effect on any ethnic group as a result of these changes. There are however positive impacts such as opportunities to improve relations with ethnic minority groups, and to improve equality of opportunity for our customers has been exploited and the changes support a long term plan to take these improvements further.
Monitoring
The impact of these changes will be monitored through customer survey and mystery shopping and results published through the annual report of The Pension Service.