Meeting Minutes

Present: Nicky Kershaw (Chair), Rodney Amis (KCL), Gill Briggs (TVU), Kate Burke (UEL), David Clover (ICS), Susan Howard (Imperial), Philip Payne (Birkbeck), Elaine Salter (Westminster)

Apologies for absence: Adam Edwards (Roehampton), Wendy Fish (Wellcome), Janet Percival (UCL)

1. CRT  Presentation

Matt Allen from Customer Research Technology Ltd attended the meeting to describe two products: Opinionmeter and STANDpoint. Both devices are designed to capture customer feedback simply at the point of experience, and the company claims that response rates are excellent.  Both devices are portable, and data is analysed via the web. Results can be exported to Excel, Word, SNAP, SPSS etc. The Opinionmeter is battery operated, and users respond to printed questions by pressing buttons. STANDpoint is a touch screen device; its software can sit on other devices, or be wall-mounted, on the desktop or on a stand. It uses GPRS, Wireless, LAN or manual connectivity.

CRT recommends that the devices are used for asking up to10 – 14 questions.

Cost: Opinionmeter £2495 + VAT
STANDpoint £3295 + Vat for first device, £2220 thereafter
Annual licence fee for web: £975+ VAT (£1075 for multilingual option)

Nicky will suggest to the M25 Steering Group that CRT should do a demonstration at an M25 meeting. M25 members would probably expect a discounted price.See: http://www.crtsolutions.co.uk Action: NK

2. Minutes of the meeting held on 14 September 2006

The Minutes were agreed as an accurate record.

3. Matters arising from the Minutes

Minute 3: user feedback. Nicky had contacted John Gilby about the possibility of having a user feedback mechanism on the website. It is not a straightforward option, and requires further thought. Feedback could come to a generic email address for the Group Chair.
Action: NK

4. Membership

Adam Edwards from Roehampton will be replacing Peter Godwin. He has expressed interest in becoming Chair, and Nicky will hand over to him at the next meeting.

Kate Burke will be leaving UEL at the end of February 2007.

5. Project to collect SLD target and performance data

Elaine circulated a first draft of our bid for funding from the M25 Consortium for a project worker. The Group agreed that the first part of the project should be a telephone survey of M25 members, to find out which 5 or 6 services they would like to see benchmarked. Depending on the results of this initial survey, we could then ask for funding to commission the project officer to gather data on the key SLDs which had been identified.

Assume 200 hours work for initial survey and report; Nicky to check with Steering Group if salary equivalent to £25K p.a. would be reasonable. Action: NK

6. Benchmarking event

David reported that the event will be held once the Wellcome project is well enough advanced to be presented as a case study; he will get back to Dave Puplett about dates.  Action: DC

Susan reported that the University of Manchester is setting up an international benchmarking club, and Imperial has been invited to join; she will be meeting colleagues from Manchester on 17 November.

7. Chartermark event

Kate has made initial contact with Dave Puplett. We would not be able to hold an event until summer 2007, and it should be led by someone who has been through the process of Chartermark assessment. UEL is being assessed on 15 November; Kate will get back to Dave Puplett after this. Action: KB

8. Date and venue of next meeting