General
I am interested in ensuring that the customer data I collect through my call centre and website is correct. How can I do this?
- By using our product Verify. This allows your call centre agent to capture a name and/or an element of an address and verify what the correct address is, and discover who lives there. There is an online version called E-Verify that can be embedded in a website to verify all addresses captured on that site.
If I want to trace people, what product should I use?
- We have two main tracing products. Our Batch Tracing product processes large numbers of data; it allows a user to input a file of names and an address and returns new addresses according to our Masterfiles. Depending on the nature of the trace, Royal Mail's National Change of Address (NCOA) redirection data can also be used to find their new address.
Our second tracing product is an interactive product called Fastrac . This allows access to historic data going back twelve years, in which a user may search back for a given name and address. It can then search forward using date and cohabitant information to find where they live today. Fastrac can be installed onsite or accessed online . Fastrac online incorporates deceased and gone-away checking.
What does suppressing data mean and how can I do this?
Suppressing data means highlighting or removing wrong records or information from your database. This could include highlighting people who have moved or died or those that don't wish to receive unsolicited telephone calls. Our software includes many sources of suppression files from which you can choose the ones want to use as appropriate for you.
Depending on the number of records and the frequency of processing, you can either send us your data for us to process as part of our Online Service View, or you can purchase our Suppress product, and process your data locally.
What does enhancing customer data mean and how can I do this?
- Additional information from various sources, including telephone numbers or demographic and lifestyle information can be appended to your data. Such details can help you understand the type of customers you have and that , for example they, tend to be aged over 45 and are interested in gardening. Thus you can tailor your promotions more effectively.
Again we can either enhance your data as part of our Online Service View , or you can purchase our Enhance software product and process your data locally.
Software Updates
How often do you update your data?
- This depends on the products purchased by the customer and the data selected. For most software products we send out quarterly updates on CD-ROM which contain a refresh of our Masterfiles dataset. The National telephone database is updated quarterly, or as an option, monthly. Online suppression databases used by Suppress and Enhance are updated either monthly or quarterly.
How often do you provide data updates to customers?
- We send out updates to most customers on a quarterly basis. However, for some products and data sets, we can send out updates more frequently if required.
Can you send the updates in a format other than CD-ROM?
- Unfortunatley not. We ship our products on CD due to the large amounts of data involved. Alternatively we offer Online Services and updates of these are done automatically.
I have a notice on my PC when using your product saying my data is due to expire, what should I do?
- This means that the Masterfiles data is due to expire so you need to install your software update. Software Updates are sent quarterly in March, June, September & December. You are given a month in which to install these updates before the data expires. The update comes with instructions and it is very easy to do. If you haven't received your update and believe you should have please contact us.
Product Information
What are the Masterfiles?
Data Discoveries Masterfiles are a database of all adults and businesses in the UK. It is multi-sourced from Royal Mail's Postcode Address File , Experian's National Canvasse (including the opt-in Electoral Roll), Thomson Business Data and National Telephone Data. The Masterfiles are updated quarterly.
What is my external IP address and why do you require this to setup a Fastrac Online account?
An external IP address is the unique identifier assigned to you by your Internet Service Provider (ISP).
We recommend that users of Fastrac Online supply us with their external IP address. Many of our clients welcome this as it ensures the application cannot be used offsite and also ensures that any data cannot be intercepted by someone else.
Your external IP address can be obtained from your IT department or there are many sites available which can identify this, for example www.whatismyip.com.
Access to Fastrac is not dependant on the supply of your external IP address.
What operating systems do your software products work on?
Fastrac, Verify, Basixs and Basixs+ require Windows 95 or later. Cleanse, Supress, Trace and Enhance are available on Windows 2000, Windows XP and Linux. We can support most systems through our Application Programmer's Interface (API).
Our software does not have particular RAM or processor requirements beyond that necessary to run the operating system. For processing speed, however, we recommend a reasonably modern system with at least 400MHz and 256MB RAM.
How much hard drive space is required on my PC for your products?
- Fastrac requires 10GB for a full installation, including the complete TrackData set of historical information; Enhance requires 3GB; Basixs requires 30MB; Basixs+ requires 150MB and all other products require 1GB.
Do I need an Internet connection for any of your products and if so why?
- Suppress and Enhance require an Internet connection to access data which is only available online.
Do your products provide any system for reporting on the accuracy of my data?
Our batch processing software products will provide a summary report detailing the number of records that have been processed and the match rates against the data files the records have been processed against. For example, it will indicate how many matched against the Mailing Preference Service (MPS) at initial and/or surname level, if this dataset was used.
Our Online Service View has graphs and charts that show the accuracy and inaccuracy of the data and changes made during the View process.
Usage
How can I perform better address searches using Fastrac?
Check the postcode first. If you don't have a valid or correct postcode, search for some elements of the address and check for a phone number.
If the individual or business is no longer there, BackTrack to find when they were last at the address and using a heuristic search, FastTrack to the current data set to find their probably new address. You can also try a name and address search for a telephone number.
My product is asking me for a licence code. What do I need to do?
- You will need to telephone Data Discoveries to get an unlock code. You should see two sets of numbers that you will need to quote before we can provide you with the relevant code. This usually only happens once a year when the annual licence is up for renewal.
I require more telephone credits. How do I go about getting these?
- Again, If you telephone Data Discoveries and state the number of credits you require, quoting the two relevant codes. We will then provide you with a code which will give you the credits.
