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Greetings from the IQCS! With summer truly over and the inspections in full swing, we thought it was high time we brought you up to date with what we’ve been up to, what we have planned for the rest of the year (and beyond!), and also welcome a few new faces...

Working Forum:
Our next Working Forum on UK and International Data Protection will be held on 12th November in an afternoon session (3.30 to 5.00 pm) prior to the AGM. The session will be held at Ludgate House - GfK NOP’s offices in Blackfriars – and will be convened by Jackie Megahey from GfK NOP and Volker Balk of the RONIN Corporation.

The subject of the forum came in response to members’ questions and concerns about international data protection laws, and how these are interpreted.

In addition to Volker and Jackie, we have invited David Evans, Senior Data Protection Policy Manager at the Information Commissioner’s Office to come along and give us an overview of, and contextualise, UK data protection rules for us.

Clients are increasingly looking to their data collection providers for specialist advice to ensure that they are compliant with local laws and guidelines, so it is important that we are all aware of our responsibilities and know where to go for guidance and the latest information. Whilst we won’t endeavor to answer everyone’s questions, we hope the session will be informative and get everyone thinking about data-protection.

We are in the process of developing the session to make sure we make this as current and relevant as possible. What issues would you like us to discuss and what information would you like us to share with membership at this session?

Please email these to Gill Wareing at:gillm.wareing@ntlworld.com

Following the Working Forum, prior to the AGM, we will be cracking open a few bottles of wine, and there will be the opportunity to network.

AGM:
The AGM will be held after the Working Forum on UK and International Data-Protection from 6pm on the 12th November at Ludgate House, GfK NOP’s offices in Blackfriars.

As well as bringing you up to date with Councils’ activities over the year, we will have Debra Harding, Deputy Director General of the MRS, updating us on the revised Code of Conduct and the latest MRS initiatives and Paul Beckett from our accountants, Baker Tilley, will be going through the financials.

At the AGM we will be welcoming new member companies and we will be looking for two new council members as we have one existing vacancy and one current council member will be required to stand down (and seek re-election). We are also looking for a user-member to replace long-standing council member, Gill Welch. IQCS user members are companies who do not have their own in-house data-collection, but commit to use providers who are IQCS accredited (and are inspected to verify this). Please let us know if you have any nominations.

Inspections:
Inspections are under way. This year we have approaching 30 applications from existing members, plus four new applicants –
Opinion Research Services, a social research company based in the University of Wales, Swansea,
Perceptive Insight, an independent full-service market research agency based in Belfast, Northern Ireland who conduct qual, quant and CATI interviewing,
Tourism South East, who conduct tourism and leisure research, marketing the South East to the domestic market. Research methodologies include: Face to face, telephone, focus groups/consumer panels and mystery shopping, and
Voice Marketing, a market research and telemarketing company based in Sheffield conducting business-to-business and business-to-consumer projects.

Don’t forget, we also have non-inspected members who follow the ISO 20252 standard. Either way, if you know of other companies who are thinking about joining, either as an inspected or non-inspected company, then ask them to please contact Gill and an appropriate advisory visit can be arranged.

Standard Revisions
We are pleased to send out the final updated version of the IQCS Standards 2009.
To produce the new standards we undertook a full consultation period with the whole of the IQCS membership which involved a working forum, 2 online questionnaires and the presentation at the AGM.

IQCS has been linked with the BS7911 since 2003 so it has not been possible to update our standards until now. Since the ISO 20252 has replaced the BS7911 last year this has given us the opportunity to do so.

Data Collection in the UK is constantly changing and evolving, with technology and online data collection increasing.

Ensure that all terminology and methodologies are up to date

Change all the good practice standards to mandatory with the exception of

checking recruiter's respondents against previous lists and written agreement to be obtained from client/research director if work is not to be validated

Streamline and simplify the minimum standards into a more user friendly

document

Add in clarifications and update the glossary of terms

Include the 2 new standards that the ISO 202052 now has i.e.

Qualitative - validation of respondent’s identity

Quantitative - the date, duration and identity of interviewer must be recorded on each questionnaire, and finally

Bringing in line the Qualitative validation timelines from 8 weeks to 6 weeks.

Don't worry, we have not rewritten the standards and changed everything! (And most importantly have not diluted any of our mandatory standards).

You will, however, find that we have grouped the sections in a more logical fashion, and initial feedback from members and inspectors is that the new format has made the manual far more user friendly.

All companies have 3 months to implement the necessary changes and from September 2009 all new and existing companies will be inspected against the new 2009 standards

These standards can also be found on the website www.iqcs.org

IQCS Party:
This year we decided to break with tradition, and instead of hosting a party in summer (when so many of us are away and the trials of finding an exclusive and affordable venue with outdoor space are usually rewarded with inclement weather on the day!), we are planning a New Years Party!

This we plan to hold in January, giving us the opportunity to celebrate the end of the inspection and accreditation process, and welcome our new members in style.

The event is planned for the 21st January 2010. We are currently looking for a suitable venue for this, so if anyone has any ideas, please contact Gill Wareing at gillm.wareing@ntlworld.com