Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate he has made of the average waiting time to speak to an adviser on his Department's helpline in the most recent period for which figures are available.

The Department for Education general enquiries helpline does not hold data on the average waiting time. During the period of 1 September 2020 to 12 February 2021, the helpline received 18,183 calls, of which 94% were answered. The system allows helpline managers to see the number of callers in the queue to speak to an adviser and managers are able to deploy extra resource to answer calls.

During the same period, the Department for Education COVID-19 helpline, received 61,709 calls of which 97% were answered with an average wait time of 290 seconds (4 min 50 sec). The COVID-19 helpline uses different call handling system and provides additional data.