The Agency completed its second annual survey during late 2002 and early 2003. Approximately 2,400 licensees took part; the survey took the form of telephone interviews, with participants also having the option to complete the survey online.

The results are being compared with those from the 2001 licensee satisfaction survey, to assess whether the Agency has sustained its high level of customer satisfaction. The information gathered will be used to review business processes, measure performance and establish an ongoing survey programme.

The Agency appreciates the contribution made by those licensees who took part in the survey.

5.2 Customer panels
The three devolved Nations, the five English Regions and Baldock each have a customer panel to help guide their activities. Every panel met at least once during 2002-03. The panels are a valuable two-way forum – we have the chance to explain the reasoning behind Agency policies, while our customers can give us their views on local and national issues. If panel members want to discuss specific topics, relevant staff from headquarters will attend the meetings. Every local office sets aside resources to be used in areas agreed by its panel members; this allows us to target extra resources in areas of concern to our customers.

An encouraging development has been the establishment of subpanels to focus on areas of interest to specific customer groups. Among the more successful subpanels is the enforcement panel hosted by the Kenley office; at its meeting in February 2003, for example, representatives of local councils, the police, the fire brigade and the Radio Authority talked to the Agency about improving co-operation to tackle pirate radio in London and the south-east.

Also this year, Northern Ireland panel members invited a communications representative from the Republic of Ireland Government to attend their panel, allowing a number of cross-border issues to be discussed.

5.3 Consultations
During the year we published 14 consultations, including one (on 'Dispute resolution under the new EU Directives') published jointly with Oftel. All these consultations, and the responses, are published on the Agency website.

5.4 Freedom of Information
The Agency complies with the Cabinet Office Code of Practice on Access to Government Information, which will remain the standard until the Freedom of Information Act (FOI) comes into force in January 2005.

We have been preparing for FOI; in 2002 we complied with its requirements by preparing our publication scheme, which was approved by the Information Commissioner and published on our website in November, meeting the target date. We also published for the first time a comprehensive list of 'who does what' in the Agency and much of our internal staff guidance, as the Act suggests.

5.5 Website
The Agency website continues to be one of our main channels of communication with our customers, enabling them to access all our published information and use our online services. This year the website attracted 2.8 million hits, an increase of 37% on last year and 174% on three years ago.

The trend towards providing information electronically rather than on paper continues; this year we sent out 6% fewer paper information sheets than last year (a 72% reduction on three years ago). Our website team has worked with colleagues in the other regulators since September 2002 on planning the Ofcom website – both the transitional site, which went live in January 2002, and the permanent Ofcom site.

5.6 Enquiry point and document distribution
During the year, the Enquiry Point handled 42,495 calls and achieved its target of answering 95% of these calls within 30 seconds.

5.7 Publicity activities – roadshows and exhibitions
The Agency had a presence at 29 events during the year, including the London and Southampton boat shows, sound broadcasting events and various amateur radio rallies around the country. We attend events to raise awareness and to give licensees the chance to meet our staff, ask questions and discuss topics of interest.

Our 'Joining In' roadshows were again a great success with our stakeholders; the autumn 2002 series included roadshows in Newport, Dunblane, Durham, Reading, Bradford, Warrington, Coventry, London, Southampton and Belfast. They aim to inform stakeholders of changes in the management of the radio spectrum, and to get feedback from them on their general concerns. We were joined by our future Ofcom colleagues at several of the roadshows, and were pleased to welcome Stephen Timms, Minister for e-Commerce and Competitiveness, at the London roadshow held at the ExCeL conference centre in Docklands.

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