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Citizens First 2000
Institute for Citizen-Centred Service | 2000

 

Citizens First 2000 builds on the work of the original Citizens First study (undertaken in 1998), and is substantially broader in scope. With over 6000 respondents, the survey is twice the size of the 1998 research, allowing greater detail and precision in measurement.

Citizens First 2000 confirms major findings of the 1998 project, tracks trends, and extends the discussion to new areas. It further explores citizens' access to government services, and it examines the drivers of citizen satisfaction as they relate to specific delivery channels such as the telephone and Internet services.

Major findings include:

  • Contrary to popular belief, Canadians rate the quality of many government services as high or higher than private sector services.

  • Overall, citizens rate the quality of specific government services higher than government services in general. Failing to differentiate these ways of defining service has led to unrealistically low estimates of government service quality in the past.

  • Citizens understand that government has a more difficult role than the private sector, balancing efficiency with the public interest. However, they still expect the quality of government services to be as high or higher than that of private sector services.

  • Many citizens perceive an overwhelming challenge when they contemplate locating a government service. Factors that affect ease of access include:

    • Obstacles such as busy phone lines, getting bounced between people, parking, and distance.
    • Previous experience with the services
    • Total length of time required to get the service

  • Many citizens struggle to access services through the government telephone directory (Blue/Grey Pages).

  • Citizens' assessments of service quality are determined primarily by five factors: timeliness, knowledge and competence of staff, going the extra mile, fair treatment, and outcome.

  • The 2000 research helped clarify the third driver, originally defined as "courtesy." Focus groups indicate that satisfaction is greatly increased when staff "go the extra mile" to ensure citizens get what they need. This adds a critical proactive step to service delivery.

  • Service delivery channels have unique characteristics. For example, drivers for telephone and walk-in services differ in that courtesy and fairness number among the drivers for walk-in services, but not for telephone services.

  • Comparing results for 1998 and 2000, service-quality ratings for a selection of public and private services did not change to a significant degree. The change that has occurred over the two years is that ratings for services "in general" go up 3 to 4 points.

  • Citizens perceive government web sites as comparable in quality to those in the private sector, identifying the drivers of satisfaction as ease of navigation, outcome, visual appeal, informative, and fast.