Executive Order

Executive Order 12862: Setting Customer Service Stds
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Title:Executive Order 12862: Setting Customer Service Stds.
Author: The White House
Date: 11 Sept 1993
Content-Type: text
Content-Length: 4113
Apparently-To: edowd@ace.esusda.gov
Status: RO
Subject: Executive Order of Sept 11, 1993 Setting Customer Service Stds.

THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
September 11, 1993

EXECUTIVE ORDER
SETTING CUSTOMER SERVICE STANDARDS
Putting people first means ensuring that the Federal Government provides the highest quality service possible to the
American people. Public officials must embark upon a revolution within the Federal Government to change the way it
does business. This will require continual reform of the executive branch's management practices and operations to
provide service to the public that matches or exceeds the best service available in the private sector.
NOW, THEREFORE, to establish and implement customer service standards to guide the operations of the executive
branch, and by the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, it is
hereby ordered:

Section 1. Customer Service Standards.
In order to carry out the principles of the National Performance Review, the Federal Government must be customerdriven. The standard of quality for services provided to the public shall be: Customer service equal to the best in
business. For the purposes of this order, "customer" shall mean an individual or entity who is directly served by a
department or agency. "Best in business" shall mean the highest quality of service delivered to customers by private
organizations providing a comparable or analogous service.
All executive departments and agencies (hereinafter referred to collectively as "agency" or "agencies") that provide
significant services directly to the public shall provide those services in a manner that seeks to meet the customer
service standard established herein and shall take the following actions:
a. identify the customers who are, or should be, served by the agency;
b. survey customers to determine the kind and quality of services they want and their level of satisfaction with
existing services;
c. post service standards and measure results against them;
d. benchmark customer service performance against the best in business;
e. survey front-line employees on barriers to, and ideas for, matching the best in business;
f. provide customers with choices in both the sources of service and the means of delivery;
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Executive Order 12862: Setting Customer Service Stds

g. make information, services, and complaint systems easily accessible; and
h. provide means to address customer complaints.

Sec. 2. Report on Customer Service Surveys.
By March 8, 1994, each agency subject to this order shall report on its customer surveys to the President. As
information about customer satisfaction becomes available, each agency shall use that information in judging the
performance of agency management and in making resource allocations.

Sec. 3. Customer Service Plans.
By September 8, 1994, each agency subject to this order shall publish a customer service plan that can be readily
understood by its customers. The plan shall include customer service standards and describe future plans for customer
surveys. It also shall identify the private and public sector standards that the agency used to benchmark its performance
against the best in business. In connection with the plan, each agency is encouraged to provide training resources for
programs needed by employees who directly serve customers and by managers making use of customer survey
information to promote the principles and objectives contained herein.

Sec. 4. Independent Agencies.
Independent agencies are requested to adhere to this order.

Sec. 5. Judicial Review.
This order is for the internal management of the executive branch and does not create any right or benefit, substantive
or procedural, enforceable by a party against the United States, its agencies or instrumentalities, its officers or
employees, or any other person.
WILLIAM J. CLINTON
THE WHITE HOUSE,
September 11, 1993.

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