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CHAPTER 5: STUDENT SUPPORT AND BENEFITS ADVICE SERVICE ( CPAG)
5.1 This chapter examines levels and reasons for usage of the Student Support Benefits Analysis Service provided by CPAG and rating of various aspects of the service.
USAGE OF CPAG HANDBOOK, ADVICE LINE AND EMAIL ADVICE LINE
5.2 All 67 respondents who said that they had used the Student Support and Benefits Advice Service were asked which specific sources of information they had used. Chart 5.1 shows that 58% had used the CPAG handbook, 31% had used the telephone advice line and 7% the email advice service.
Chart 5.1
Usage of CPAG information
CPAG HANDBOOK
Frequency of Usage of CPAG Handbook
5.3 Those respondents who used the CPAG handbook were asked to state how often they used it in various situations and the results are shown in chart 5.2.
5.4 Responses showed that the handbook was used to approximately the same extent in each of the different situations, with 33% using it as a reference when sourcing information or as a prompt when providing information or advice to current/potential learners, 31% as a prompt for providing information or advice to others, and 28% as a source of information for themselves. Very few respondents (between 8% and 13% for each option) said they did not use the handbook at all in each situation.
Chart 5.2
Whether used CPAG handbook
Awareness and Usage of Online CPAG Handbook
5.5 All those who had used the CPAG handbook were asked whether they were aware of the on-line version of the handbook. In total, 33 of the 39 respondents (i.e. 85%) said that they were aware that it was on-line. When these 33 interviewees were asked if they had used the online version exactly a third had while two-thirds said they had not. Therefore, in total only 11 out of all 508 respondents interviewed had used the online CPAG handbook.
Helpfulness of CPAG Handbook
5.6 The 39 respondents who had used the CPAG handbook (online or not) were asked to state how helpful they felt it was on a scale from 1 to 10, where a score of 1 indicated they found it extremely unhelpful and a score of 10 indicated they found it extremely helpful.
5.7 No respondents awarded a score of less than 5 and the average score was 7.97. Views were largely positive, with just over a fifth (21%) giving it a score of 10 and a further 41% either 8 or 9. All the remaining respondents gave a score of either 5 (5%) or 6 or 7 (33%).
Chart 5.3
Helpfulness of CPAG handbook
CPAG ADVICE LINE
Usage of CPAG Advice Line
5.8 Those respondents who used the CPAG telephone advice line (21 in total) were asked to state how often they used it in various situations and the results are shown in chart 5.4.
5.9 Responses showed that a minority of respondents (between 10% and 14%) used the Advice Line all the time for the various purposes listed, athough a majority claimed to use this some of the time (between 67% and 76%) for each purpose.
5.10 There was a degree of variation in terms of the proportion claiming to never use the Advice Line for each purpose, with 10% saying they never used it as a reference when sourcing their own information, 14% saying they never used it as a prompt when providing information or advice to current or potential learners, 19% that they never used it when providing information or advice to others and about a quarter (24%) that they did not use it as a source of advice for themselves.
Chart 5.4
Whether used CPAG Advice Line
Helpfulness of CPAG Advice Line
5.11 The 21 respondents who had used the CPAG Advice Line were asked to state how helpful on a scale from 1 to 10 they felt it was where a score of 1 indicated they found it extremely unhelpful and a score of 10 indicated they found it extremely helpful.
5.12 As with the CPAG Handbook views were largely positive with no respondent awarding a score of less than 5. Over a quarter (29%) gave a score of 10 and a further 48% a score of 8 or 9. The average score awarded was 8.33.
Chart 5.5
Helpfulness of CPAG Advice Line
CPAG EMAIL ADVICE LINE
5.13 As noted earlier, only 7% of the 67 respondents who used the Students Support and Benefits Advisory Service said they had used the CPAG email Advice Line. As this represented only 5 respondents, results for subsequent questions on this area are to be treated as merely indicative.
5.14 Levels of usage of the email Advice Line in various situations were as follows:
- All five respondents said they used the email system some of the time as a source of information for themselves or as a prompt when providing information or advice to others;
- Four of the five said they used the system some of the time as a prompt when providing information or advice to current or potential learners or when sourcing for their own information, with the other interviewee saying this never happened.
5.15 Again, these respondents were asked to state how helpful on a scale from 1 to 10 they felt the email advice line was. Two gave a score of 10, a further two gave a score of 8, and the other respondent scored it at 6, providing an average of 8.40.
CPAG TRAINING COURSES
Attendance at CPAG Training Courses
5.16 The 67 interviewees who had used the Student Support and Benefits Advice Service were asked whether they had attended any training courses on benefits and student support. Results in chart 5.6 show that only a minority (19%; n = 13) had attended a relevant course, 79%; (n = 53) had not and 1% did not know.
Chart 5.6
Attendance at CPAG training courses
Helpfulness of CPAG Training
5.17 The small number of respondents (n = 13) who had attended the CPAG training, rated this highly, with the lowest score given on a scale of 1 to 10 (where a score of 1 indicated they found it very poor and a score of 10 indicated they found it excellent) by any respondent being the one interviewee who rated it at 6 out of 10. Three respondents each gave scores of 7, 8, 9 and 10. This resulted in an average score of 8.31.
5.18 In summary,
- Across the sample of intermediaries as a whole, there was low usage of any elements of the Student Support and Benefits Advice Service.
- Of those intermediaries who had used the Student Support and Benefits Advice Service ( CPAG), the majority (58%) had used the CPAG handbook, 31% had used the telephone advice line and only 7% the email advice service. Views on the handbook in terms of its usefulness were largely positive.
- Although most of these intermediaries were aware that the CPAG handbook was available online, only 11 had actually used this.
- Only 21 intermediaries had used the CPAG telephone advice line, although this was rated positively by users in terms of its usefulness.
- Only 5 intermediaries had used the email advice line (again this was rated positively in terms of its usefulness).
- Only 13 intermediaries had attended a CPAG training course, although again this was positively rated by attendees.
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