Success Stories
DSA Shifts Communication Channels to Reduce Avoidable Contact and Enhance Service to Customers
Needs Assessment
The Driving Standards Agency (DSA) is one of the executive agencies that forms the Motoring and Freight Services group within the Department for Transport (DfT). DSA is a national organisation that delivers practical driving tests from over 400 driving test centres and 140 theory test centres throughout England, Scotland and Wales. The agency prides itself in providing exceptional customer support through communicating and sharing the information that is most important to its stakeholders. DSA’s primary customers include driving instructors and driving test candidates.
DSA had an email service and list of nearly 40,000 addresses. The service was unreliable, subscribers had very few preferences available to them, and each email sent resulted in around 10,000 ‘undeliverable’ reports being returned to the DSA email inbox. DSA discontinued the service in April of 2009.
Solutions
Upon seeing the successful implementation of the GovDelivery digital communication platform at a sister agency of the Department of Transport (the Highways Agency), John Ploughman, DSA’s Digital Communications Manager, developed a business case for the acquisition of a digital communication solution. After comparing GovDelivery to solutions used at other agencies, DSA found the platform provided more functionality, was scalable, and was competitively priced. With a clear understanding of the cost-savings and enhanced communications capabilities benefiting its citizens and partners, DSA launched the service in January 2010 as “DSA Direct” with the tagline “News direct to you, when you want it.”
DSA sends out automatic alerts on topics such as news and social media; learning to drive and ride (everything from driving a lorry to riding a motorcycle); approved driving instructors; and updates on The Highway Code, essential reading for everyone in England, Scotland and Wales.
Results
Within six months, Driving Standards Agency built a total subscriber base of nearly 18,500 and sent more than 812,700 messages since first offering the service in January of 2010. The agency has had the fastest sign-up rate of any of GovDelivery’s UK clients.
The benefits to DSA and its customers were immediate and plentiful. For DSA staff, they now have a single and easily-managed communications platform that supports their goal of promoting information that is most important and impactful to their customers. In some cases it’s important to let DSA’s subscribers know about a new video that’s been published on YouTube® because it explains changes that have been made to the driving test. Other times, it may be explaining how industrial action might affect driving tests. That’s the biggest benefit DSA gets out of GovDelivery – the ability to use the preferences that their subscribers have set up to make sure that they find out about what’s important to them.
