CRA Annual Corporate Survey - 2008 Survey

Prepared for the:
Public Affairs Branch
Canada Revenue Agency
FINAL REPORT
November 2008
POR# 015-08
Contract #46558-095116/001/CY

Prepared by:
Ipsos Reid Public Affairs

Le rapport complet en français sera fourni sur demande.

To request a full copy of this report, please contact Library and Archives Canada at:
613-996-5115 or 1-866-578-7777 or www.collectionscanada.ca

Media Enquiries:
Media Relations
Canada Revenue Agency
4th Floor 555 MacKenzie Avenue
Ottawa ON K1A 0L5
media.relations@cra-arc.gc.ca

Executive Summary

Research purpose and objectives

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) is responsible for administering taxation laws for the Government of Canada. The Agency undertakes research on a regular basis to measure Canadians' experiences and satisfaction with the services and programs that the CRA provides. Since 2000, the CRA has been conducting an annual survey with national representative samples of Canadians to assess attitudes towards the Agency and satisfaction with aspects of specific programs. In 2005, the CRA redesigned the annual survey to focus on corporate-wide issues and established a new baseline for measuring the Agency's performance over the next five-year period (2005 to 2009). The current survey is the fourth wave of this tracking study.

Methodology

The Agency's 2008 Annual Corporate Survey was conducted by the Environics Research Group. The 2008 survey consisted of telephone interviews conducted July 3 to 26, 2008, with 4,105 Canadians. The questionnaire was largely the same as the one used in 2007, with two questions removed and one question added to the core survey, and no "dynamic" section was asked. The sample was stratified to provide meaningful results in each of the 10 provinces. A national sample of this size will provide results accurate to within plus or minus 1.5 percentage points in 19 out of 20 samples (larger margins of error apply for subgroups of this population). A more detailed description of the methodology used to conduct this survey is presented at the back of this report, along with a copy of the questionnaire (see Appendix).

Key findings

The 2008 Annual Corporate Survey reveals that the Canada Revenue Agency is continuing to maintain a consistently positive public image. Annual incremental increases since tracking began show the proportion who rate the Agency's overall performance as excellent or good rise from 37 percent in 2005 to 44 percent in 2008.

Overall satisfaction with a recent service contact has not changed and complete satisfaction with key service aspects has either remained stable or slightly increased since a slight dip in 2007. However, Canadians remain marginally less likely to completely agree that information provided by the CRA is accurate or easy to understand. This last area is the one in which the Agency has typically received lower ratings and may reflect the complex nature of the information they are required to provide.

Ratings of the CRA and its service continue to be linked to more general perceptions about taxation and the federal government as a whole. While Canadians typically do not point to specific problems they may have had in dealing with the Agency when giving an overall performance rating, it is clear that level of satisfaction with service contacts is linked to overall approval of the Agency's performance.

Complete agreement with statements about the CRA's integral values has returned to or achieved the highest levels since tracking began. Agreement remains strongest for "character" values such as confidentiality and professionalism than for the more administrative measures such as efficiency and cost-effectiveness, about which Canadians may feel they know less. During the course of the four years of this tracking research, the extent to which the CRA is perceived as reflecting its key corporate standards has proven to be an important driver of overall attitudes about the Agency. This is most notably the case when it comes to perceptions about efficient operations and treating Canadians with respect.

Date modified:

2009-08-12