A friend of mine has told me that he received the following invitation from Opinion World to participate in a survey about Ofcom. The message claimed that and assured him that the survey was confidential and that he would not be identified. He did not really understand why he had received this invitation since it claimed that he had "recently" contacted Ofcom, and apparently he had not so done recently.

Nevertheless he accessed the site to participate. When he entered the fact that he did not know which member of his family had "recently" contacted Ofcom he was ejected from contributing further. He then thought that he would test the "confidentiality" guarantee. He therefore accessed the site again, but was identified as already having accessed it !! It is quite clear therefore that this survey is not confidential at all. Any invitee is identified immediately and their details are clearly logged, as will their "contribution" or response so be also.

Be warned therefore. Anyone receiving this invitation from Opinion World should be aware that this is not a confidential survey as claimed. You participation will be logged and your response will be identified against your name and who knows what else also.

 

Dear XXXXXX,

We are carrying out a survey on behalf of Ofcom among people who have recently contacted them with an enquiry or complaint. The survey is to find out people’s views on the service provided by Ofcom and will take no more than 10 minutes to complete. Results of this survey are confidential and will be presented to Ofcom in the form of statistical summaries only. No individual will be identified as having taken part in the survey. Your views are very important to Ofcom so please click to participate in this survey. Completing the questionnaire will take approximately 10 minutes!

All your answers will be treated in the strictest confidence and your responses will only be analysed in an aggregated way.

We appreciate your time is valuable

Thank you in advance for your co-operation.

To proceed with the study simply click this link:

Start the study




© Copyright OpinionWorld 2006  
 

I have received this survey and had recently contacted the Ofcom Contact Centre.  I gave them a maximum negative score on most items along with a few choice comments regarding Ofcom's real master not being the citizen consumer but the business interests of the telcos.  Also the fact that there is no formal escalation beyond the Contact Centre if they cannot adequately answer your question and the fact that they always try to dodge logging most calls they receive as formal complaints about Ofcom policy.

Its no good me posting the link to the survey as every link is individual and can only be uses to reply to the survey once.

Here is the email I received:-


Quote:

Dear NGMs Ghost, We are carrying out a survey on behalf of Ofcom among people who have recently contacted them with an enquiry or complaint. The survey is to find out people’s views on the service provided by Ofcom and will take no more than 10 minutes to complete. Results of this survey are confidential and will be presented to Ofcom in the form of statistical summaries only. No individual will be identified as having taken part in the survey. Your views are very important to Ofcom so please click to participate in this survey. Completing the questionnaire will take approximately 10 minutes! All your answers will be treated in the strictest confidence and your responses will only be analysed in an aggregated way. We appreciate your time is valuable Thank you in advance for your co-operation. To proceed with the study simply click this link: Start the study

I got one of these emails as well.

One of the questions asked if I was complaining about the cost of calls when I made the complaint.  I answered no (which is true) and then that was the end of the poll.

It seems to me that Ofcom want opinions of the cost of calls only - are they too high, etc...?

bbb_uk wrote on Mar 7^th, 2007 at 6:17pm:

I got one of these emails as well. One of the questions asked if I was complaining about the cost of calls when I made the complaint.  I answered no (which is true) and then that was the end of the poll. It seems to me that Ofcom want opinions of the cost of calls only - are they too high, etc...?

Strange as my survey did not end there but went on to finish with a section asking for more general freehand comments on how the Ofcom Contact Centre is run and then finally my age group,  ethnic group, etc, etc.

I wonder if there is a fault with the server they have running the questionnaire coping with the initial demand.

NGMsGhost wrote on Mar 7^th, 2007 at 6:23pm:

Strange as my survey did not end there but went on to finish with a section asking for more general freehand comments on how the Ofcom Contact Centre is run and then finally my age group,  ethnic group, etc, etc. I wonder if there is a fault with the server they have running the questionnaire coping with the initial demand.

I didn't get the impression it ended abruptly or anything as it said thank you, etc after I answered no to the 'were you complaining about call charges' question

bbb_uk wrote on Mar 7^th, 2007 at 7:06pm:

I didn't get the impression it ended abruptly or anything as it said thank you, etc after I answered no to the 'were you complaining about call charges' question

I don't really remember there being a call charges question - there might have been.  But it mainly all seemed to about the Ofcom Contact Centre and whether I was delighted or not with how they had handled my complaint.

NGMsGhost wrote on Mar 7^th, 2007 at 7:27pm:

I don't really remember there being a call charges question - there might have been.  But it mainly all seemed to about the Ofcom Contact Centre and whether I was delighted or not with how they had handled my complaint.

I only really got a 3 or 4 questions from what I remember.

Something like 'am I the person in our household who recently contacted Ofcom?', 'was the enquiry personal or business?', 'was it a complaint or enquiry?', and finally 'was it concerning the cost of calls?'.

As I said, as soon as I answered no to that question, then that was it - survey ended.

bbb_uk wrote on Mar 8^th, 2007 at 8:19pm:

As I said, as soon as I answered no to that question, then that was it - survey ended.

I think I said that my contact with Ofcom has been about the cost of calls and there were then another 10 or 12 questions asking whether I was Very Satisfied, Fairly Satisfied, Neither Dissatisfied or Satisfied, Dissatisfied or Very Dissatisfied withe various aspects of how Ofcom had addressed the issues I had tried to raise.  There were also two freehand comments boxes to fill in as well.

NGMsGhost wrote on Mar 8^th, 2007 at 11:04pm:

I think I said that my contact with Ofcom has been about the cost of calls and there were then another 10 or 12 questions asking whether I was Very Satisfied, Fairly Satisfied, Neither Dissatisfied or Satisfied, Dissatisfied or Very Dissatisfied withe various aspects of how Ofcom had addressed the issues I had tried to raise.  There were also two freehand comments boxes to fill in as well.

Definitely a different survery then.