Memo

The Census Bureau plans to conduct additional survey work under the generic clearance for Data User Evaluation Surveys (OMB number: 0607-0760).

The International Trade Management Division’s FY 2016 Customer Service Survey

Purpose of the Study

The Census Bureau’s International Trade Management’s (ITMD) Trade Outreach Branch is planning a survey to gage customer service satisfaction levels of the ITMD and the Automated Export System (AES). The AES is the electronic filing system which the Census Bureau and U.S. Customs and Border Protection have established to process Electronic Export Information (EEI). The feedback from this survey will help the Census Bureau develop and implement improvements in customer relations. The key research questions or substantive issues being examined are:

• Satisfaction of customer as it related all services provided by ITMD

• Possible improvements for current programs

• Development of new programs to improve customer needs

Research Design and Methodology

Census Bureau statisticians who routinely design census questionnaire, surveys, and other research studies review all research methodology and documentation. Pretesting is done with internal staff, a limited number of external colleagues, and/or customers who are familiar with the programs and products being studied.

We would like to have the email addresses for each respondent, should they be the winner of one of the incentives we put in, or need to be contacted about suggestions.

Respondents

In September 2016, we will send a broadcast to our subscribers (105, 613) inviting them to take the survey, in addition to placing an invitation on the Global Reach Blog (13,203 subscribers). We plan to maximize response rate by including an invitation e-mail, reminder e-mail, and a thank you e-mail.

Burden

The ITMD staff have reviewed and internally tested the questionnaire for ease of use and content appropriateness. Based on similar surveys that we have conducted, we expect to receive 1300 responses. We estimate respondent burden at 7 minutes per questionnaire for a total respondent burden of 152 hours.

Incentives

All respondents who complete the survey are entered into a drawing for on free ticket to attend an AES Compliance seminar we offer currently.

Attachments/Enclosures

• ITMD Questionnaire

• E-mail Messages

For further information about this study, please contact Josefina Hicho at 301.763.7669 or josefina.hicho@census.gov