INFORMATION REGARDING CLERKS ANNUAL QUESTIONNAIRE

Here is an update from Ida Smith of the OGA regarding the Clerks Annual Questionnaire:

pcusa with phl color backDear Presbytery Stated Clerk,

Six more weeks of winter, please say it isn’t so! In addition to this being a hard winter for a lot of us, it’s been a difficult year for statistical reporting! Thank you for your patience and understanding as we deal with problems with the Clerk’s Annual Questionnaire. As you may be aware, we were required to use new software to collect the data for the CAQ this year. As a result, your completed CAQ reports print out at 14 pages or more, clerks cannot easily verify that their congregation’s data is submitted, and presbytery staffs are unable to view which congregations have completed the questionnaire.

I have been getting an overwhelming number of phone calls from congregations asking questions about the CAQ. While I am trying my best to respond to all questions, I wanted to share the answers to some of the most common questions with you. Please consider forwarding the following list of questions and their answers to each congregation in your presbytery that has not yet completed the CAQ.

One of those emails talks about all the problems this year with the CAQ. We normally have it programmed but our web programmer left to take another job so we had to use new software and found out it has limited capabilities. When a church hits “finish” it sends it. I will receive it then. It gives them an option to print but then prints out an ugly and long (12 or so pages long) report. If a church enters the pin number again, it will let them fill it out again (and again—one church has done it 6 times!)

I have been recommending that people use the blank copy to write or type (it’s a WORD document) their answers and save that as their hard copy if they want to keep their report to 5 pages to keep as their record.

Was my report submitted?

  • Once a clerk hits the “finish” button on the survey, the report is sent, and we will receive it.

How do I print my report?

  • After clicking the “finish” button on the survey, the next page will show the congregation’s results. At this point, the clerk can print these results, although the printout will be long (14-18 pages). Another option for clerks is to print out the blank pdf copy of the CAQ (made available in the first paragraph of the survey) and write in their responses on this copy to save.
  • Once clerks close out of the computer screen that displays their CAQ results, the survey software doesn’t allow the clerk to go back in and pull up the congregation’s results to print. The software will instead pull up a blank copy of the survey, as if it was never submitted. However, clerks can go in and partially enter their data, leave the survey, and return to the survey at the place they left off, as long as they don’t hit the “Finish” button until they are definitely finished with the survey.

I’ve entered the wrong PIN number; what do I do?

  • If a clerk enters the incorrect PIN number at the beginning of the survey, their computer will keep asking the clerk to fill out the report for that congregation. In order to submit the data for the correct congregation, the clerk will need to delete the “cookies” (internet browsing history) on their computer, try entering the survey on a different computer or mail or fax a hard copy of their completed survey to Ida Smith  at ida.smith@pcusa.org .

Please note that for next year, we expect to have the CAQ programmed like it has been in the past.

Ida Smith

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