The REAL Assurance Scheme aims to ensure high standards of service from its members. We will monitor the performance of our members in various ways to promote and encourage these high standards. On a regular basis we will carry out the following activities. We will report the results to the panel, and to the Office of Fair Trading in an annual report.
We will carry out regular audits of members' performance. Each year we will audit one third of our members. A copy of the questionnaire we use to carry out these audits is available here:
We will send consumer satisfaction questionnaires to one third of our members each year. They must provide them to their customers who return them directly to us for analysis. (The questionnaires are anonymised.) A copy of the questionnaire we use to assess consumer satisfaction is available here:
We will also assess our members' compliance with the Code from the customer's perspective, by means of mystery shopping exercises on one in ten of our members each year. Mystery shoppers, carefully selected and briefed by REAL, will pose as normal customers and then provide detailed objective feedback on their experiences. In doing this, we comply with good practice set out in the Guidelines on Mystery Customer Research issued by the Market Research Society. A copy of these Guidelines is available here.
Finally, we will analyse complaints we receive about members who have not complied to the Code, and we will analyse any cases that have gone to conciliation or arbitration.