2120-SAFE Program Survey Part A_revised

Department of Transportation

Federal Aviation Administration

Paperwork Reduction Act Supporting Statement

Aviation Safety, Flight Standards Service

Safety Awareness, Feedback, and Evaluation (SAFE) Program

OMB Control Number 2120-XXXX

Introduction

This information collection is submitted to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to request a three-year approval clearance for the information collection entitled, Safety Awareness, Feedback, and Evaluation (SAFE) Program.

Part A: Justification

1. Circumstances that make collection of information necessary.

Executive Order 12862 Setting Customer Service Standards signed September 11, 1993 and most recently updated in Executive Order 13571 requires the Federal Government to provide the “highest quality service possible to the American people.” Under the order, the “standard of quality for services provided to the public shall be: Customer service equal to the best in business.” The Executive Order defines customers as “individual or entity directly served by a department or agency” and “best in business” as defined by “the highest quality of service delivered to customers by private organizations providing comparable or analogous service.” We in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Flight Standards Service refer to our customers as “stakeholders,” as it more accurately represents the unique relationship that we have with our aviation partners.

The FAA Flight Standards Service designed the SAFE Program to continuously promote and improve overall aviation safety. The program goals are accomplished by periodically surveying stakeholder groups to measure the effectiveness of FAA regulatory processes and products and collect feedback on the quality of provided services. The survey outcomes form the basis of program improvements to ensure stakeholders are effectively served. The outcomes and planned improvements are shared with stakeholder groups.

2. How, by whom, and for what purpose is the information used.

The information collected will be used by FAA Flight Standards Service to improve the quality and delivery of the services and products provided to their stakeholders. Specifically, the Flight Standards Service will use the information collected for the following purposes:

• Promote and monitor continuous program improvement to maintain the safest aviation system in the world;

• Identify service areas that are not up to standard based on our stakeholders’ experiences and determine what improvements are needed to effectively serve our aviation partners;

• Produce responsive action plans that address effectiveness of the SAFE program by sustaining aspects of the program found to be effective and, where needed, introducing improvement strategies; and

• Implement and evaluate action plans within the Flight Standards Service and with stakeholders to ensure safety improvements occur at the point of need.

3. Extent of automated information collection.

To the maximum extent possible, the collection effort will rely on electronic submission and communication methods. Beyond reducing costs, the use of electronic collection methods is expected to reduce the burden on the respondents and improve return rates. The postal mail will be required for initial contact and follow-on reminders because “postal address” is the only contact information available in the official FAA databases.

Announcement of the upcoming surveys will be posted on FAA and trade websites frequented by stakeholders. Each randomly selected stakeholder will receive a mailed letter inviting them to participate in the survey. The invitation will include details on how to access the online survey either via a computer or mobile device, or how to request a paper version of the survey through email, telephone, or postal mail. Reminders to participate in the survey will be sent only to those who have not responded via postal mail. The multi-mode approach supports generational differences in preferred methods of communicating and takes into account lack of computer access and experience.

4. Efforts to identify duplication.

Stakeholders are the sole source of the information to be collected. It does not exist elsewhere in a comparable format, nor is it (or something similar) collected from other FAA or government agencies.

5. Efforts to minimize the burden on small businesses.

There is no anticipated burden to small businesses.

6. Impact of less frequent collection of information.

Within the current program, we expect to survey each stakeholder group once every four years. By collecting information on a less frequent basis, the FAA Flight Standards Service risks providing sub-par services and products to stakeholders and potentially fails to perform to posted standards.

7. Special circumstances.

No special circumstances exist.

8. Compliance with 5 CFR 1320.8:

A 60-day notice for public comments was published in the Federal Register on April 12, 2013, vol. 78, no. 71, pages 22020-22021. No comments were received.

9. Payments or gifts to respondents.

No payments or gifts provided to respondents.

10. Assurance of confidentiality:

All data provided will be kept private to the extent possible by law. To preclude the identification of individual respondents, unique identifiers will be assigned and they will be instructed not to provide any identifying information; however, prior to use by the FAA, the contractor will review all text entries and “sanitize” them by replacing identifying information with generic terms as placeholders. Only analyses and reports of aggregate data will be produced and released. The data will be collected, analyzed, and reported in accordance with guidelines from the Office of the Secretary of Transportation on Customer Service Standards.

11. Justification for collection of sensitive information:

No sensitive information will be collected.

12. Estimate of burden hours for information requested:

The estimates in the below table are based on:

• 2013 population data;

• 95% confidence level and +3% margin of error in computing sample size of required returns for each stakeholder group,

• 20 minutes, on average, to complete the survey in any of the response modes,

• income data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), and

• a 3-year approval period for annualized hour burden and cost of collection.

Annual hour burden: The total average annual burden for the 3-year approval period is 531 hours per year. A mixed mode survey approach is being used in an effort to offset the individual burden by providing a means of requesting a print version and the convenience of on-demand electronic versions. This allows the respondent to choose how and when to complete the survey.

Stakeholder Group	Population Size (2013 data)	Estimated Sample Size (95% confidence level, +3% margin of error)	Estimated Hour Burden (20 minutes per respondent)	Estimated Cost to Respondent (based on median hourly rate from BLS)	Estimated Cost of Data Collection
Commercial and Airline Transport Pilots	254,863	1,063	354	$18.20	$6,442.80
General Aviation and Non-commercial Pilots	200,215	1,062	354	$13.65	$4,832.10
Repair Station Operators	4,801	873	291	$9.59	$2,970.69
Aviation Maintenance Technicians and Repairers	334,694	1,064	354	$8.75	$3,097.50
Air Carrier Operations Management	2,213	720	240	$12.96	$3,110.40
Total			1,593		$20,453.49
Annualized			531		$6,817.83

13. Estimate of total annual costs to respondents.

The total cost to stakeholder groups for data collection is $20,453.49 for the 3-year approval period, or $6,817.83 annually (see above table).

14. Estimate of cost to the Federal government.

The FAA plans to leverage existing customer satisfaction formats (survey files, database structures, programming code, and reports) used in the past to minimize total costs. Additionally, every effort will be made to reuse products created in the conduct of the first stakeholder group data collection for subsequent data collections. Research assistants, technicians, and data entry clerks from Xyant Technology will assist in this effort. The projected costs of the tasks the contractor will perform are in the following table.

Support Activity/Product/Deliverable	Projected Cost ($)
Build and manage database	25,150
Create distribution list and manage returns	28,230
Develop surveys across modes (computer, mobile, paper)	48,000
Gather existing file formats and create stakeholder templates	1,939
Generate and run statistical code	29,340
Generate item results	30,000
Manage survey submissions	10,500
Print and mail (invitations, reminders, requests for paper survey)	75,000
Process and scan	12,200
Provide tech support for online access	9,000
Transcribe and sanitize free text entries	30,635
*TOTAL (contractor costs)	299,994

In addition, projected total salary costs for FAA employee(s) during the collection period is $31,320.

The estimated annual cost to the federal government is $110,440 for collecting feedback from five separate stakeholder groups across the approval period.

15. Explanation of program changes or adjustments.

This is a new collection; therefore, it is a program change.

16. Publication of results of data collection.

A single stakeholder survey will generally occur within a 15-18 month window with each stakeholder group being surveyed only once within the approval period. The following table shows the schedule for the entire project.

	6 months prior to OMB	Year 1		Year 2		Year 3
Group 1	prepare survey	admin & analyze	report
Group 2		prepare survey	admin & analyze	report
Group 3			prepare survey	admin & analyze	report
Group 4				prepare survey	admin & analyze	report
Group 5					prepare survey	admin & analyze	report

17. Approval for not displaying the expiration date of OMB approval.

Not applicable.

18. Exceptions to certification statement.

No exceptions.

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