The energy industry standard REC stipulates that this research is mandatory for energy companies installing over 5000 smart meters per year, whereby they have to provide their customers an opportunity to give feedback on the installation process. We adopted a mixed-mode CATI and online approach to collect this feedback on behalf of Opus Energy/Drax.

This project involves tight timings around sample delivery and even stricter processing times, with a very restricted window of interviewing time after the installation process. Despite these restrictions, we maximise the number of online completes over telephone completes to maintain a low operating cost on the project for the client.

Walnut created the mixed mode survey using ConfirmIT to allow for easy transfer of sample between online and telephone data collection methods. We were also able to write rules which blank customer PII after the data becomes invalid due to the length of time between feedback collection and survey installation date.

Results are delivered to the template stipulated by REC in a timely manner allowing the Drax Group to provide the final submission to REC and fulfil their obligation. Amendments are also made to the installation process as a result of the analyst teams reviewing the data and identifying areas for improvement.