The Center for Scientific Review
(CSR), NIH is responsible for: formulating grant award peer review
policies; receiving most Public Health Service research and
research training applications (almost 40,000 a year); assigning
applications to peer review groups; and directing scientific and
technical review of these applications. Input from our customers is
essential to our efforts to improve our operations and provide
excellent services. The major respondent group is customers,i.e.
grant applicants/researchers/investigators.
EO: EO
12862 Name/Subject of EO: Customer service standards
CSR is requesting a
reinstatement without change of No. 0925-0474 to continue the
activity of assessing customer satisfaction with the organizational
and process changes made by CSR. A 30-day notice was published on
October 28, 2014 in a timely manner. However, the OMB package was
inadvertently not submitted. The 30-day notice is being
re-published. NIH policy changes since 2011 and enhancements in
technical support have increased the need for more frequent
customer satisfaction surveys with a broad stakeholder
constituency. The 2011 OMB approval was for 5075 responses and 1438
burden hours. However, there are more initiatives being undertaken
by CSR each year which results in additional respondents. In May of
2014 we had to request 1000 additional burden hours to complete a
new focusing on a study of new investigators and their submission
experiences. The initiative survey lengths will be comparable. For
the e-mail surveys, the anticipated annual hour burden for FY 2015
through FY2017 is 4,323 hours for approximately 8,165 respondents
in each of the 3 fiscal years. Focus groups will be convened,
primarily for the purpose of customer input into the design of
satisfaction surveys. Each focus group is expected to require 1.5
hours per person and will include approximately 12 members. CSR
expects to have 20 focus groups per year. The focus groups are
expected to take 1.5 hours per respondent to complete. The annual
burden for focus groups is estimated to be 360 hours for each of 3
fiscal years.
On behalf of this Federal agency, I certify that
the collection of information encompassed by this request complies
with 5 CFR 1320.9 and the related provisions of 5 CFR
1320.8(b)(3).
The following is a summary of the topics, regarding
the proposed collection of information, that the certification
covers:
(i) Why the information is being collected;
(ii) Use of information;
(iii) Burden estimate;
(iv) Nature of response (voluntary, required for a
benefit, or mandatory);
(v) Nature and extent of confidentiality; and
(vi) Need to display currently valid OMB control
number;
If you are unable to certify compliance with any of
these provisions, identify the item by leaving the box unchecked
and explain the reason in the Supporting Statement.