ANI Survey Description

Request for Approval under the “Generic Clearance for the Collection of Routine Customer Feedback” (OMB Control Number: 0960-0788

T ITLE OF INFORMATION COLLECTION: ANI Reroute to WBDOC Project

PURPOSE:

The Social Security Administration (SSA) has determined that our National 800 Number Network (N8NN) receives tens of thousands of calls on a monthly basis, from as many as 50 different automatic number identifications (ANIs), also known as telephone numbers. We believe that the individuals initiating the calls may be using some type of automation (automatic dialers) to reach SSA. Regardless of whether this is true, we suspect that some of the callers are contacting our N8NN for reasons other than SSA business (for profit, for fraudulent purposes, etc.).

Calls from high volume ANIs that do not involve legitimate SSA business have a negative impact on the customer service we provide to callers who do have legitimate business with SSA. Specifically, callers who do have legitimate business with SSA are waiting longer in queues to speak with an agent.

We have no information about the origin (e.g., location) of these high-volume calls, other than the ANIs. We would like to use the “ANI Reroute to WBDOC Project” to determine if any of the identified ANIs are generating calls that do not involve SSA business.

We plan to route a portion of the calls received from the high volume ANIs to a dedicated staff of approximately 20 Customer Service Technicians (CSTs) in our Wilkes-Barre Data Operations Center (WBDOC). The group of CSTs will complete a questionnaire for every call beginning approximately November 10, 2011 and ending approximately February 2, 2012. The CSTs will determine if the call does involve SSA business (e.g., the caller wants to file a retirement claim), or does not involve SSA business (e.g., appeared to be computer generated or originated from a Telemarketer). The CSTs will ask willing participants to respond to five questions in an attempt to obtain information about the origin of the call. In addition, they will provide responses to two questions, regardless of participation from the caller.

We have classified the “ANI Reroute to WBDOC Project” as a customer satisfaction survey because we will use information obtained from this project to improve customer satisfaction. Specifically, if we find that all calls originating from a specific ANI do not involve SSA business, we will block all future calls coming from that ANI. This will improve customer satisfaction by reducing the time that legitimate callers have to wait before speaking with an agent. Our focus is to ensure that these callers reach an agent as quickly as possible. By doing so, we believe the customer experience will improve and ultimately increase our customer satisfaction rating.

DESCRIPTION OF RESPONDENTS: Individuals who contact SSA’s National 800 Number Network from specific ANIs that appear numerous times on our call records within a short period of time.

TYPE OF COLLECTION: (Check one)

[ ] Customer Comment Card/Complaint Form [X] Customer Satisfaction Survey

[ ] Usability Testing (e.g., Website or Software [ ] Small Discussion Group

[] Focus Group [ ] Other: ______________________

CERTIFICATION:

I certify the following to be true:

1. The collection is voluntary.

2. The collection is low-burden for respondents and low-cost for the Federal Government.

3. The collection is non-controversial and does not raise issues of concern to other federal agencies.

4. The results are not intended to be disseminated to the public.

5. Information gathered will not be used for the purpose of substantially informing influential policy decisions.

6. The collection is targeted to the solicitation of opinions from respondents who have experience with the program or may have experience with the program in the future.

Name: Pat Taylor

To assist review, please provide answers to the following question:

Personally Identifiable Information:

1. Is personally identifiable information (PII) collected? [ ] Yes [X] No

2. If Yes, is the information that will be collected included in records that are subject to the Privacy Act of 1974? [ ] Yes [ ] No N/A

3. If Applicable, has a System or Records Notice been published? [ ] Yes [ ] No N/A

Gifts or Payments:

Is an incentive (e.g., money or reimbursement of expenses, token of appreciation) provided to participants? [ ] Yes [X ] No

BURDEN HOURS

Category of Respondent	No. of Respondents	Participation Time (minutes)	Burden (hours)
Individuals	30,000	1	500
Totals	-	-	500

FEDERAL COST: The estimated annual cost to the Federal government is _____$0 (we will be using current SSA employees, and this will not require extra work hours on their part)______

If you are conducting a focus group, survey, or plan to employ statistical methods, please provide answers to the following questions:

The selection of your targeted respondents

1. Do you have a customer list or something similar that defines the universe of potential respondents and do you have a sampling plan for selecting from this universe? [X ] Yes [] No

If the answer is yes, please provide a description of both below (or attach the sampling plan)? If the answer is no, please provide a description of how you plan to identify your potential group of respondents and how you will select them?

Although SSA will not be conducting statistical sampling for this focus group, we do have a defined universe – specifically, the list of numbers from which numerous calls to SSA are being made. We will identify potential respondents by simply verifying that are calling us from a specific “automatic number identification (ANI)” or telephone number. We will select as many individuals from this group that we can, based on CST availability. If CSTs are not available to handle calls, the calls will be automatically routed to the main N8NN queue for traditional handling.

Administration of the Instrument

1. How will you collect the information? (Check all that apply)

[ ] Web-based or other forms of Social Media

[X] Telephone

[ ] In-person

[ ] Mail

[ ] Other, Explain

2. Will interviewers or facilitators be used? [X] Yes [ ] No

Please make sure that all instruments, instructions, and scripts are submitted with the request.

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