Shape Tomorrow study

Thank you for taking part. The information you give us is protected by law and treated as confidential.

Find out more about how we protect your data.

Before starting, please check that the letter is addressed to your household. If you do not live at the address on the letter, do not start the survey. You will need to enter the household access code from your letter to begin.

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The Shape Tomorrow study covers a range of topics, including:  

• work, retirement, and unemployment  

• training and education  

• health and well-being  

• travel to work 

• characteristics and background 

You should complete the survey by the deadline date in your letter. Once your whole household has completed the survey, we will offer you a £10 gift voucher.

Questions can be based on facts or opinions. No specialist knowledge is needed to take part. Your honest answers help us produce reliable statistics about society.

Your answers will be saved each time you move to the next page. You can return to complete the survey any time up to the deadline using the same household access code. Exactly how long the survey takes to complete depends on the number of people in the household and their characteristics.

To keep your data secure, survey sections will automatically lock as you progress. This means they can no longer be accessed by yourself or any other member of the household. Once locked, answers cannot be changed.

If you are not able to return to complete the survey, the information you have shared with us is still useful. Saved data will be submitted and, where possible, will be used for analysis.

The survey is available online in English and Welsh, you can change the language at any point.

Alternatively, you can contact us if you would like to:

• book a telephone interview

• find out about our translation service

• request large print or Braille letters

• ask further questions

Everyone living at your address should take part using the same household access code from the letter you received. Anyone aged 16 years or over can answer for themselves or on behalf of other household members if they give their permission.

The survey includes detailed questions, so it is best if each person answers their own section. They can ask any other adult for help to complete the survey if they need it.

A small number of questions are asked about household members aged 15 years or under, an adult should complete these on their behalf.

It is important that everyone aged 16 or over in your household sees the letters and leaflets we send and agrees to take part.

For further information about our studies, see our studies.

The Office for National Statistics run lots of different studies in order to produce official statistics. Find out more About studies about people, families and households.

This study is carried out by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the UK's largest independent producer of statistics. The ONS is not linked to any political party. Read more about what we do.

Taking part in this study is your chance to help us understand the changing needs of the whole community.

The information you provide is used to create statistics, such as official employment and unemployment rates. These statistics influence interest rates, which impacts mortgages, debts, pensions and savings. You can read about these in our statistical bulletins.

Government departments, public bodies and charities use our statistics for many projects, including:  

• improving health care, well-being, and social care services  

• removing barriers to work and supporting people unable to work  

• meeting the need for housing, school places and recycling services

Addresses have a fair and equal chance of being chosen to take part and cannot be replaced. It is important to represent your local area, although you do not have to take part.

The information you provide cannot be found anywhere else. You will be offered a £10 gift voucher to say thank you within 30 days of your whole household completing the study. Find out more about the Shape Tomorrow gift voucher.

From time to time, we may run experimental research, which means your data are not used directly for outputs but are used to inform changes to the data collection tool. This research is important to help us improve data quality and ensure individuals across the UK are properly represented in our statistics.

Some addresses are invited to our five-part study to help us measure changes over time. These addresses are chosen at random to represent their community.

If you have been chosen you will be asked to complete the same survey every three months, up to five times in total. The more surveys you complete, the more helpful your answers are.

You will be offered a £10 gift voucher each time the whole household fully completes a survey. That’s up to £50 worth of gift vouchers if you complete all five surveys. Don’t worry if you miss a survey, you will still be invited to complete the next one. If you miss more than one survey in a row, we will remove you from the study.

It’s important we hear from you each time, even if nothing has changed. Asking questions over time helps us understand life in the UK and how it is changing.

We know that some of the information you give us won’t change, like your date of birth, sociodemographic information and past qualifications. Over the coming months, we are working on improvements to save you giving us this information lots of times. Once we implement these improvements, we will reuse the answers you provided the first time for all future surveys you choose to complete as part of this study. This means that subsequent surveys should be quicker than the first one you complete.

To make sure we only reuse correct information, when you start a new survey, we will show you a list of names of the people who were living at the address for the last part of the study. You will be asked if the same people live there. You can update the information if people have moved or changed names. To keep everyone's data safe, you will not see any answers from past surveys except names.

It is possible that the residents living at a sampled address could change part way through the study. If you move out of the address before all five parts are completed the new residents of the address will be invited to complete the next survey.

If the new residents choose to take part, they will be shown the names of the people who previously completed the survey. This is so they can tell us if this information is incorrect and update it. Only names and no other information about those people can be accessed. Your answers are safe and private. We process your personal data in line with UK GDPR.

It is important we understand the circumstances of the people currently living at the address and does not matter if they are different people to those who took part last time. This will help us to understand how the needs of local communities change over time.

The information you provide will be combined with the data from across the country and will not be used to identify you or your household in any way. 

All the information you submit is protected by law and treated as confidential under the Code of Practice for Statistics.

Collected information will be held securely for five years or until it is no longer being used for producing statistics. It will then be deleted. All identifying details will be removed at the earliest opportunity.

This de-identified information may be shared with approved accredited researchers for statistical purposes only. Information is shared through our Secure Research Service, find out more about our approved researchers scheme.

The ONS has commissioned a third party, the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA), to carry out some of the data collection for the Shape Tomorrow study. 

The ONS will receive all data collected and remain in control of all information given by participants.

The ONS shares selected information with service providers to run our studies. They only receive the information they need to carry out their role.

These organisations help the ONS to:  

• send your gift voucher (the service provider for this is Pluxee, a subsidiary of Sodexo)  

• get in touch with you with your permission (these service providers are GovDelivery and GovNotify)  

• securely collect the information you give (these service providers are NISRA and TotalMobile) 

Your name and email address will be shared with Pluxee to send your e-voucher. Pluxee will not use this information for any other purposes. Eligible retailers are subject to change as per Pluxee's terms and conditions. A plastic gift card is available on request although retailers may vary. Find out more about the Shape Tomorrow gift voucher.

For more information, see data protection and data protection and studies about people, families and households.

For accessibility assistance, email accessibility@ons.gov.uk.

To take part over the phone, call us for free on 0800 085 7376.

Opening times are:

9am to 6pm Monday to Friday
9am to 1pm Saturday

For further information about our social studies, see our studies.

If you have any other queries, see our get in touch web page.

When you are ready to take part, please return to begin study.