CRPUD Earns Highest-Ever Overall Performance Score in Customer Survey

June 23, 2017 – Customers overwhelmingly approve of Columbia River PUD’s performance. In a recent customer satisfaction survey, the PUD earned an overall performance score of 9.23 on a scale of 1 to 10. 61% gave the PUD a perfect 10.

Bruce and Carolyn Shoemaker of Acti-Dyne Research presented the survey results to the PUD’s Board of Directors on June 20.

“This is the highest score for overall performance that you’ve ever received,” Bruce Shoemaker said. “This is a very positive thing.” The PUD’s previous best score for overall performance was a 9.11 on the survey conducted in 2006.

Customers also gave the PUD its highest ever rating for outage response. The average score was 8.99, with 57% of customers rating the PUD a 10 out of 10. The PUD’s previous best score for outage response was an 8.80 on the 2006 survey.

“We heard lots of good comments about service and reliability,” said Carolyn Shoemaker. “People said that this was one of the toughest years ever and they got through outages quickly.”

Shoemaker said that any score above 7 should be considered a great score. All of the scores on the benchmark questions were higher than 7 out of 10.

“The overall results are just excellent, as far as I can see,” said PUD Director Rob Mathers.

The survey also included questions about PUD programs, services, and new opportunities:

  • 26% of those polled were interested in participating in a community solar program. Another 36% may be interested in such a program.
  • 82% were in favor of the PUD continuing to fund community events and programs. On average, they recommended spending about 5% of the PUD’s revenues on such events.
  • 26% supported the PUD extending office hours Monday-Thursday, and closing on Friday. 14% supported the existing hours, and 60% had no preference.

“I’m very pleased with the results of this survey,” said General Manager John Nguyen. “The high marks underscore our employees’ commitment to providing exceptional service to customers. The survey also lets us know what’s important to our customers, and the areas we can focus on.”

Acti-Dyne conducted the survey from March 27 through May 12, 2017. All PUD customers were invited to take part. Surveys were available online, in person at the PUD office, and by telephone. A total of 1,025 customers completed the survey, making this the largest survey conducted by the PUD.

“This survey gives you a very accurate picture of what PUD customers think,” Bruce Shoemaker said. “I put a lot of faith in these ratings because of the size of the sample and the different ways people could participate.”

The PUD has used the same customer satisfaction questions since 1992. But, in prior surveys, customers could choose “Don’t Know” as a response. This survey did not include that option. Bruce Shoemaker explained that this could result in slightly lower average scores than previous surveys. Participants might choose a 5 or a 6 if they didn’t know an answer, he said. Future surveys will follow this year’s format.

Acti-Dyne’s presentation of the survey results is available at www.crpud.net/2017survey.