In this article
To author a survey for CATI, users must first have a project - refer to the separate Professional Authoring documentation for details. After a new project is created, the collection modes for the survey are assigned in the Project Management > Survey Settings option. Next go to the Survey Channels tab and select the checkbox titled “CATI survey”. If the survey is to also be run in CAWI mode you can also check the “Web survey” box.
Note: Certain CATI specific functionality in the survey designer will not be available unless the CATI collection mode is enabled.
Figure 1 - Applying the required survey data collection channels
With the CATI collection mode enabled it is possible to adjust some project settings which relate specifically to telephone interviewing via the CATI Options tab.
Figure 2 - Assigning CATI specific project options
Important
For surveys that are to be run in CATI mode, it is highly recommended to launch the survey in CATI mode before telephone sample contacts are uploaded. Any combination of modes that include CATI is acceptable, but the "CATI survey" mode should be enabled. If telephone sample contacts were accidentally added to a survey that is launched without the CATI mode enabled then the supervisor can enable CATI mode, re-launch and then perform a manual sync operation (by choosing Synchronize Respondents from the context menu in the surveys list.
Note: Predictive dialing is only supported if the appropriate dialer add-on is used.
- Dial Mode : For systems enabled with an automatic dialer add-on, several automatic dialer operation modes are available:
- Manual - Interviewers dial numbers manually
- Preview - Interviewers can preview background information on an contact before allowing/commanding the dialer to commence auto-dialing.
- Automatic - In this mode the system delivers the next connected call to the interviewers one after another.
- Predictive - This dialing mode is designed to increase the productivity of the interviewers by performing "predictive" dialing. In this mode the dialer applies various algorithms that help to deliver the call to a free interviewer while keeping the number of failed ("nuisance") calls to a minimum. A dialer operating in this mode tracks and processes the call results to predict based on statistics when a number should be dialed, with the aim of delivering the interview to an interviewer immediately after the previous interview is finished.
- Hybrid dialing - Some calls can be flagged to work in Preview mode, while others are dialed predictively. This is useful when calling back for appointments in cases where comments have been captured in a previous call attempt. The survey's scheduling rules can set the call to be dialed in Preview mode so that the interviewer can read the comments before starting the call.
- Enable openend reviewing by interviewers: When checked interviewers will be able to go back over any questions where verbatim responses have been entered at the end of each call.
- Enable whole interview audio recording: If supported (integrated dialer required), this option will turn on whole interview audio recording for every interview. Audio files are stored on the dialer server indefinitely.
- Enable whole interview screen recording: This option will enable video recording for every interview (the resulting video recordings can only be accessed by the Supervisor GUI). The monitoring console must be installed to facilitate playback. Screen recordings are held for 30 days on the Forsta Plus servers.
- Display answer codes in survey: This option is recommended. When enabled, answer code values will be shown next to the answer category checkboxes and radio buttons (required for keyboard support).
- Enable scheduling for web interviewing: Enable this option for mixed mode survey projects where there is a requirement to have calls that are transferred between modes run through the assigned scheduling rules. When this setting is enabled, completed web interviews will call the execution of the scheduling rules so that the call is dropped from the scheduled CATI calls list.
- Enable automatic removal of calls for numbers in the telephone blacklist: When the telephone number blacklist is enabled, the system checks each number to be dialed against the blacklist before this number is dialed. If the number to be dialed matches a number that is on the blacklist, this number is not dialed, the corresponding call is not delivered to the interviewer, this interview extended status is changed to "Blacklist", and the scheduling is not run for the call.