Office Christmas closure

OCSI will be closed from Monday 21 December to Friday 1 January inclusive.

We will not be able to respond to any Community Insight support requests during this time. We will answer emails when the office re-opens Monday 4 January.

We hope you have a lovely break over the festive period!

Download all the data in Community Insight at MSOA level

We have extended the All Data Download feature so that you can now download all the data (more than 1000 datasets) in Community Insight at MSOA level as well as at LSOA level. 

We hope that access to the raw data at both LSOA and MSOA level will make further analysis even easier. 

How to download the data 

Both the MSOA and the LSOA data downloads are accessible as CSV files on the Reports tab. The files will be updated on a quarterly basis, so that you always have the latest data at your fingertips. We will send an email notification to all users every time the files are updated.

What does the file contain?

Data download for all LSOAs in England – This file contains data for all the indicators in Community Insight at LSOA level, as well as the associated metadata (e.g. name, description, date, source). 

Data download for all MSOAs in England – This file contains data for all the indicators in Community Insight at MSOA level, as well as the associated metadata (e.g. name, description, date, source). 

How to find the MSOAs you care about

Column E indicates the Local Authority each MSOA resides in. You can filter this column to show only the MSOAs for a selected Local Authority / number of Local Authorities. This will make the file more manageable. 

Further analysis

The All Data Download makes further analysis easier outside of Community Insight. For example, anybody within your organisation could very quickly and easily:

  • Use Excel or other visualisation tools to produce your own charts and tables for use in your analysis.
  • Identify which (if any) of your LSOAs/MSOAs are in the 10% most deprived nationally for the index of multiple deprivation.

Or you could delve even further into the data, using the Rank command in Excel for benchmarking or using conditional formatting to see whether the areas you care about score relatively high or low compared to other areas. 

Download data for other geographies  

To download data for your stock groups in Community Insight you can build a custom dashboard and export the data.

Full guidance and feedback

For more information on using the All Data Download, please read through the Help Centre.

If you have any thoughts and feedback on this new addition then get in touch on support@ocsi.co.uk. We’d love to hear how you are going to use the All Data Download and if there is anything we can do to make the process of accessing and analysing data any easier.

Time series data for unemployment benefit in Community Insight

Explore how unemployment changed during the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown with times series data in Community Insight. 

The Department for Work and Pensions publishes Unemployment benefit (JSA and Universal credit) every month. In turn, we update the data in Community Insight to show the latest monthly snapshot. 

Given the dramatic changes to unemployment and the effects that it may have on your communities, we have added in the previous 3 months unemployment benefit data as individual indicators, so that you can see the month-on-month change for your areas. These datasets can be displayed on the map and downloaded for your stock groups.

Alongside the usual monthly updates for Unemployment (June 2020), we have added 3 historical time-points for the indicator Unemployment benefit (JSA and Universal credit):

  • March 2020
  • April 2020
  • May 2020

How to view this data on Community Insight

The map

  1. Click on the Data button
  2. Search Unemployment using the search bar
  3. You will see the most recent Unemployment benefit (JSA and Universal credit) indicator for the month of June 2020 and the 3 historic timepoints listed beneath

Click on image to see full size

Download the data for all 4 timepoints for your stock groups

  1. Click on the Data button
  2. Search Unemployment using the search bar
  3. You will see the most recent Unemployment benefit (JSA and Universal credit) indicator for the month of June 2020 and the 3 historic timepoints listed beneath
  4. Select the first time point
  5. Click on the Info button
  6. Click Data for your areas (this will open up a popup with data for your stock groups)
  7. Click Download this dataset in CSV format
  8. Repeat this process for the other 3 timepoints 

Click on image to see full size

Please note in the Data for your areas popup the table of data has two columns. The first column shows the percentage figure, the second column shows the count data. When you export the data to a CSV, only the percentage figure is exported. Adding the count data to the export is one of our development priorities and will be coming soon. 

On the Dashboard

You can only view the latest time point for Unemployment benefit (JSA and Universal credit) on the dashboard

In the reports 

This data has not been added to the reports. The reports do however already contain a chart that shows how Unemployment benefit (JSA and Universal credit) has changed since 2004 (page 10).

Figure: Unemployment benefit (Jobseekers Allowance/Universal Credit) claimants Source: Department for Work and Pensions

Figure: Unemployment benefit (Jobseekers Allowance/Universal Credit) claimants
Source: Department for Work and Pensions

Would you like to see more time series data in Community Insight?

We are looking at options to include more time series data within Community Insight. Please email support@ocsi.co.uk with any suggestions for what would be useful and to register interest in taking part in future user research on this topic. 

Removed Monthly Change in Unemployment Indicator

We have removed the indicator Monthly Change in Unemployment. The new indicators for Unemployment benefit (JSA and Universal credit) for the last four months supersede this indicator. For those groups who had it assigned to a theme, it will no longer be available. 

Further reading

If you are interested in how COVID-19 has affected employment and the economy more broadly, take a look at some of our recent analysis: 

How to upload non-numerical survey data to Community Insight

Community Insight offers a number of ways to add your own organisational data into the system. The Upload your data functionality allows you to import datasets that display on the maps in the same way as the standard datasets that we include in the tool for you.

You can use this functionality to upload some non-numerical results of surveys that you run with tenants with a little bit of data reformatting.

This guide will run you through the process of uploading your data in this way.

You will need to be a Group Admin to upload your own data to Community Insight.

A choropleth map displaying percentage data on current smokers

 

1. Is your data suitable for uploading in this way?

You will first need to determine whether the data you want to upload is suitable for the Upload your data tool. 

The dataset must have:

  1. Geographic data: When uploading survey data, you will most likely want to use postcodes
  2. Binary data: The survey question must have only two possible responses.

Suitable:

As part of an annual residents survey, you collected respondents’ postcodes and asked ‘are you a current smoker?’

  1. In this case, you have suitable geographic data for every respondent (their postcode)
  2. The respondent can only answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to this question, so it is suitable to upload into Community Insight.

Not suitable:

As part of an annual residents survey, you collected respondents’ postcodes and asked ‘what is your ethnic group?’

  1. In this case, you have suitable geographic data for every respondent (their postcode)
  2. The respondent could give a wide range of answers to this question and so it is not suitable to load in as the tool cannot import categorical data.

If you are unsure whether your dataset can be imported in this way, please get in touch at support@ocsi.co.uk and we can talk it through with you.

2. Set up your metadata

Go to:

  • Group Admin
  • Manage your data
  • New dataset

General guidance for setting up metadata can be found in the Help Centre.

When setting up the metadata for survey responses, take note of the following points:

  • Description: Make it clear that the data has come from survey responses. You may want to include details on the question that was asked and the sample size
  • Percentage suffix: When you import the data into the tool it will display as a percentage. Make sure you add the percentage sign to the Suffix box when asked
  • Decimal points: Depending on what you are uploading, you may want to include one or two decimal places
  • Aggregation method: You will be asked ‘how should we create data for higher areas from your uploaded data?’ You must select Averaging here
  • Suppression: If you are uploading postcode level data that is potentially sensitive, you can select a suppression threshold (Please see the Help Centre for more information on suppression).

3. Format your data

When it comes to importing your data, you can do this by uploading a CSV file or through copying and pasting values.

In each case, you will need to ensure that you have two columns of data correctly formatted in an Excel document. 

  • Geographic data: In one column, you will need a postcode (or other geographic code) in each row. 
  • Binary, numerical data: In another column, you will need your survey responses in numerical format.

4. How to turn your survey data into numerical data

Let’s go back to the earlier example of asking ‘Are you a current smoker?’ Each respondent would have answered ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

In order to import the data into Community Insight, you need to turn this into numerical data. To do this, all the respondents that answered ‘No’ should have the value of 0 and all the respondents that answered ‘Yes’ should have the value of 100.

Shows three columns in an Excel spreadsheet displaying survey data, numerical data and postcodes

Tip: You can bulk change all your responses to numerical data using the Find and Replace functionality in Excel.

  • Find all instances of ‘Yes’ and replace all with 100
  • Find all instance of ‘No’ and replace all with 0

Screenshot showing the Find and Replace all functionality in Excel

Alternatively, you could also use an IF statement to do this. This may be a better option if your survey results are denoted by single letters (eg. ‘Y’ and ‘N’) as you may end up replacing some of your postcode data using a simple ‘Find and Replace all’.

5. Import data

You can now import your data into Community Insight. At this stage, it doesn’t matter if you have more columns than you need – you will be able to filter these later.

If your spreadsheet includes formulae (eg. if you have used an IF statement), you must save the file as a CSV file, rather than Excel, before importing.

Follow the on-screen instructions to import your data. Further guidance is available in the Help Centre:

6. Add dataset to your maps and dashboard

Now that your data has been imported, you can add it to your Map and default dashboard using the Manage Indicators functionality.

The data will be displayed on your maps and dashboard as percentage figures.

Improvements to Community Insight to help save you time

We are excited to introduce two new improvements that enable you to:

  • Search for indicators on the map more easily
  • Identify your areas with ease using MSOA names 

Search for indicators on the map more easily

Community Insight has over 1000 indicators. With so much data available, being able to find what you are looking for quickly is important.

We have added a search bar to the Data dropdown on the Map page so that you can hone in on what you are interested in, in far fewer clicks.

Data search bar

How to use

  1. Click on the Data button to open the menu of themes and their indicators 
  2. The search bar is at the top. Type in any text and the indicators that contain that string of text will be displayed under their theme heading
  3. Click on an indicator name to view it on the map
  4. To show the full menu of indicators again, delete the text in the search bar 

Please note: Not all indicators within Community Insight are shown within the Data menu by default. There are over 1000 datasets in Community Insight and the Group Admin user(s) select which ones are shown. If a user searches for an indicator that is available in Community Insight but not assigned to a theme then nothing will come up in the search.

 

Identify your areas with ease using MSOA names 

MSOAs are an integral geography in Community Insight. You can view indicators on the map at MSOA level and you can create stock groups out of MSOAs. However, MSOA codes are not easily recognisable – they are made up of two parts: The parent Local Authority and a string of numbers. For example, Westminster 018. 

Meaningful Names

The House of Commons Library has created a set of meaningful names for MSOAs (also available on an interactive map). We have added these names into Community Insight to make it easier for you to find the areas you are interested in. As part of this, we have also changed the LSOA names to incorporate the name of the parent MSOA to help you have a better idea of where the LSOA is located.

 

Previous MSOA code New MSOA names 
Westminster 018 Strand, St James & Mayfair – Westminster 018
Westminster 019 Knightsbridge, Belgravia & Hyde Park – Westminster 019
Westminster 020 Central Westminster – Westminster 020


Where can you see these new names?

The names can be found in two places on Community Insight: 

  • When hovering over areas on the map
  • When creating stock groups out of MSOA or LSOA areas

 

When hovering over areas on the map

  1. Choose an indicator from the Data button and select to display it on the map 
  2. Zoom in to view the data at either MSOA or LSOA level (the Info popup will inform you at which level you are viewing the data)
  3. Minimise the Info popup, and then hover over the areas on the map
  4. In the top right hand corner will be a small box that displays the MSOA/LSOA area name and the value for that area

MSOA hover

 

When creating stock groups out of MSOA or LSOA areas

In Community Insight, you can create stock group areas made up of MSOAs and LSOAs. The new names will now display in the stock group creation popup. 

  1. Click Group Admin Manage stock groups
    1. Click Add stock group
    2. Select Area Type Based on standard area
  2. Select to browse the list of MSOAs or LSOAs

MSOA names

Please note: Only Group Admin and Power Users can create stock groups in Community Insight.

If you are unfamiliar with the terms LSOA and MSOA, these are statistical geographies created for the Census. Read more about them in our blog: LSOAs, LEPs and lookups : A beginner’s guide to statistical geographies.

Get in touch!

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to get in touch with us on support@ocsi.co.uk or give us a call on 01273 810270

Add additional information to your stock data

We have made some major improvements to the Stock feature on Community Insight so that you can now add additional information to your properties and view that on the maps page.


blog 1

The enhanced functionality allows you to add more information to Community Insight so that you can see information for individual properties. Coupled with the socio-economic data available within the system and the locally held datasets you can add in, this improved functionality contributes to making Community Insight a one-stop shop for local information. 

 

The developments focus on:

  • Enhancing the Stock functionality to allow you to add additional information to your individual properties
  • Improving the error feedback and the importing process so that you have a more streamlined experience
  • Improving the speed so the maps page loads quicker

 

This blog is here to give you a rundown of all the changes including:

  • What’s new?
  • What has been improved?
  • Potential use case

For step-by-step guidance, please read through the Manage Stock section on the Help Centre.

What’s new in Community Insight?

Previously, you could upload your stock properties, categorise them into a maximum of 30 types and then view those properties on the map. Now, along with assigning a stock type you can also add individual information for each property, which can then be displayed on the map.

Adding metadata is optional and completely customisable. To add metadata to your properties you can input information in the 5 columns to the right of the postcode and stock type columns.

Please note: If you use the Organisations feature then your metadata goes in the 5 columns after that Organisations column.

blog 2

Below is an example of how metadata will display on the map once uploaded.

blog 3

For step-by-step guidance, please read through the Manage Stock section on the Help Centre.

What has been improved?

Removed copy and paste option

Previously, you could upload your stock by either copying and pasting or uploading a CSV. We have removed the copy and paste option. Removing this option allowed us to focus on improving the error feedback and speeding up the upload process.

 

Better error feedback

We have improved the error feedback you receive when uploading stock so that any formatting issues can easily be identified and rectified. This should make uploading stock a smoother & less confusing process.

 

Improved site performance

We have focused on speeding up the time it takes for the stock to load on the map. This is something which has been raised by users in the past and is an issue for those organisations who have very large property portfolios. This work means that you can now upload more information about your properties without seeing a significant drop in the performance of the site.

Potential use case

Understanding the areas you work in

Use Community Insight to combine the data you have on your properties with the socio-economic context of an area, to get a better understanding of your tenants and their needs. 

 

Upload your stock with the added metadata 

Now that you can add information to individual properties, you will need to upload your latest stock. 

For step-by-step guidance, please read through the Manage Stock section on the Help Centre.

 

The enhanced functionality allows you to add additional information to individual properties, which will then be displayed on the map when an icon is clicked on. The information you add is entirely up to you. For example, you could add any of the following:

  • Number of bedrooms in a property 
  • Number of occupants in a property
  • Council Tax Band 
  • Repairs due
  • Smart meter 

 

The example below demonstrates the kind of information you could upload and how it must be formatted.

blog 4

Download your property data for an area 

In Community Insight you can create stock groups, these are areas which can be standard areas or more bespoke areas created by you. Once you have successfully uploaded your stock data with the additional information, Community Insight will match the stock to your stock groups thereby allowing you to see the stock you have in an area. You can also download the list of stock in an area

To do this go onto the maps and select to view an area on the map, then click on the i icon next to the area name, this will open up a popup detailing more information about that stock group with the option to “Download list of stock”.

blog 5

blog 6

Visualise your property data on Community Insight 

Once you have successfully uploaded your stock data, you can view this on the map by clicking on individual stock icons. This allows you to visualise your property information in a more accessible way.

You can use the Display Mode to enter full screen and then take a screenshot of the maps to add into presentations.

Overlay socio-economic data alongside your property data

Layer the property data you have uploaded with the standard socio-economic datasets in Community Insight so that you can see the housing provision alongside the needs of an area.

blog 7

Feedback

We are always looking for more feedback and would also love to hear how you are using the improved Stock functionality, so please do get in touch with us on support@ocsi.co.uk

Identify areas with higher proportions of people from at-risk groups

Hi all

We hope you, your loved ones and your colleagues are keeping as well and safe as possible at the moment. 

We have had a few requests for guidance on which datasets within Community Insight could be used to help inform responses to COVID-19 through identifying areas with higher proportions of people from at-risk groups.

Our Research Team has produced a list of datasets that may be useful covering:

  •  at-risk groups: including older people, underlying health conditions and benefit claimants for health and disability 
  • groups requiring additional support: including single-person households, households with no cars and prevalence of dementia
  • economic factors: (key workers and vulnerable sectors). 

These are all available in Community Insight England and can be used immediately. We have also made these available as a mini data download at MSOA level for England .  Please share with anybody that might find it useful.

There are also two new indicators available in Community Insight that could be useful:

  • Households on Universal Credit – Limited Capability for Work Entitlement: This captures those who are receiving Universal Credit due to poor physical or mental health. Universal Credit is increasingly replacing legacy work-limiting illness related benefits including Employment and Support Allowance and Incapacity Benefit so it provides a more comprehensive measure of those out of work due to poor health and disability.
  •  Personal Independence Payment (PIP), respiratory disease claimants: This measures those who are receiving additional financial help to manage conditions associated with respiratory diseases including asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, bronchiectasis, cystic fibrosis, pulmonary fibrosis, pneumoconiosis, heart and lung transplants and various lung diseases and diseases of the upper and lower respiratory tract.

For a reminder on how to add indicators to your Maps, please see Customise themes and indicators. You can select which indicators appear on the Dashboard from within the dashboard itself using the  Build a custom dashboard functionality.

Many of you must be under enormous amounts of pressure at the moment. Please let us know via support@ocsi.co.uk  if there is any additional support we can give you during this time and we will do our very best to help. 

How to create stock groups based on top 10% most deprived LSOAs

Within Community Insight it is really quick and easy to set up any custom geography you are interested in – whether that is a ward, a local authority, parish or GP locality.

Another type of area (or stock group in Community Insight) that may be of particular use to you, is a composite area of all the LSOAs in your service patch that fall within the top 10% or 20% most deprived nationally, according to the Index of Multiple Deprivation.

It is fairly straightforward to work out which LSOAs fall within these deciles in your area and then create a stock group based upon these LSOAs through selecting from the standard areas dropdown.

Step-by-step guide

Here is a step-by-step guide for identifying the LSOAs to include, with the help of a handy tool from Swirrl.

1. Open the IMD Explorer tool

Visit http://imd-by-geo.opendatacommunities.org/imd/2019/area

2. Select the geography

Select the Local Authority or County that you are interested in from the list.

3. Select the index you are interested in:

Most organisations will likely be interested in the overall Index of Multiple Deprivation. However, if you are interested in a particular theme, such as health or employment, you can choose one of these domains instead.

4. Select the decile you are interested in:

If you are interested in the top 10% most deprived LSOAs, select decile 1 and download

If you are interested in the top 20% most deprived LSOAs, you will need to download the data for decile 1 and decile 2 separately

NB: If this produces an empty file, it means that there are no LSOAs within your service patch that fall within this decile.

The following steps assume you are looking at the top 10% most deprived (decile 1). You will need to repeat these steps for decile 2 if you are looking at the top 20% most deprived.

5. Remove duplicates

The file you have downloaded provides you with all of the postcodes that are in the top 10% most deprived alongside their corresponding LSOA codes. For this purpose, we are only interested in the LSOAs that are in the top 10% most deprived, so you need to remove the duplicates in the LSOA code column (column C). To do this:

  1. Click on the Data tab in the tool bar
  2. Select Remove Duplicates
  3. Select the ‘LSOA Code’ check box only
  4. This is now your list of individual LSOAs within your service patch that fall in the top 10% most deprived nationally.
remove duplicates

Click on image to see full size

6. Create your stock group in Community Insight

You can now create your stock group in Community Insight. Please note, you must be a Power User or Group Admin to be able to do this.

The easiest method to create the stock group in Community Insight is through the Create a stock group by selecting a standard area option. This guidance is for users looking at one local authority. If you are creating an area for a county, please see step 7.

  1. Provide a name and description for your area (Please note names cannot be longer than 255 characters)
  2. In the stock group type box, select create area based on standard area
  3. Select LSOA as the geography
  4. Select the local authority the LSOAs are in
  5. Select from the dropdown all the LSOA codes that correspond to those in your download (if you have a few LSOAs you can use Control+F, or Command+F on a Mac to find the codes you need)
  6. Save the stock group
create custom area

Click on image to see full size

7. Create a stock group that spans multiple local authorities

If you are creating a stock group that spans multiple local authorities (such as a county), please send the full list of LSOA codes you would like included in your area to support@ocsi.co.uk and we can set this up for you.

8. Explore data for your custom area

Your stock group is now ready to use. You can now:

Office Christmas closure

We hope you have a lovely break over the festive period!

OCSI will be closed from Monday 23rd December to Friday 3rd January inclusive. We will not be able to respond to support requests during this time. We will answer any support requests when the office re-opens on Monday 6th January.

As another year draws to a close we are, as ever, appreciative of your continued support. Thank you to all our clients who have made 2019 a year to remember. Here’s to what 2020 will bring!

Community Needs Index indicators now in Community Insight

 

Community Insight is the first platform to publish the new Community Needs Index, which can be used to help policymakers target investment in social infrastructure.

Introducing our newest set of indicators in Community Insight: Community Needs Index (CNI). This suite of indicators has been produced by OCSI to measure social and cultural factors that can contribute to poorer life outcomes. OCSI was commissioned by Local Trust to develop a quantitative measure of ‘left-behind’ areas (you can read the full publication to find out more about the research). As part of this, we developed a Community Needs Index, the first composite indicator of its kind, looking at the social and cultural factors that can contribute to poorer life outcomes.

We have included four new datasets in Community Insight; the scores for each individual domain and the overall CNI. In each case, a higher score indicates higher levels of community need.

  • Community Needs Index: Civic Assets score
  • Community Needs Index: Connectedness score
  • Community Needs Index: Active and Engaged Community score
  • Community Needs Index: Community Needs Score

This blog will provide more information on the data and how you can explore it in Community Insight.

About the data 

The CNI is particularly exciting as it gives a different perspective to more economically based measures of local need and is a useful measure in and of itself to help policymakers target investment in social infrastructure. 

The index has been developed at ward level after significant consultation and debate. The principal reason for selecting wards as the units of analysis as opposed to Lower Super Output Areas (LSOAs) was that wards align more closely with community boundaries and are of a sufficient size to cover locally recognised neighbourhoods. There is, of course, a potential risk that this can mask variations in community need at a very local level. We have run the same analysis at LSOA level and the results are broadly consistent with the ward level data. 

The index covers 19 indicators, across three domains;

  • Civic Assets: Measures the presence of key community, civic, educational and cultural assets in close proximity of the area. These include pubs, libraries, green space, community centres, swimming pools – facilities that provide things to do often, at no or little cost, which are important to how positive a community feels about its area.
  • Connectedness: Measures the connectivity to key services, digital infrastructure, isolation and strength of the local jobs market. It looks at whether residents have access to key services, such as health services, within a reasonable travel distance. It considers how good public transport and digital infrastructure are and how strong the local job market is.
  • Active and Engaged Community: Measures the levels of third sector civic and community activity and barriers to participation and engagement. It shows whether charities are active in the area and whether people appear to be engaged in the broader civic life of their community.

For a more detailed look at the indicators included within the CNI, please have a flick through the slides below.

Using the data in Community Insight 

This figure shows the Community Needs score in the East of England where the need is particularly high, especially around the agricultural Fen areas near the Wash.

This figure shows the Community Needs score in the East of England where the need is particularly high, especially around the agricultural Fen areas near the Wash

Technical information

Please note, the Community Needs Index indicators are only in Community Insight England. There is no data available for Community Insight Wales or Scotland.

As the data was developed at Ward level, we have apportioned the data in order to be able to include it within Community Insight at standard geographies. The ward score was copied down to Output Area level (every OA in the ward got the same score) and then aggregated to all higher geographies using population-weighted aggregation.

Where an LSOA fits exactly in a ward it will also have the same score as the ward it fits in. Where an LSOA cuts across wards e.g. 60% of people in the LSOA lived in ward A and 40% in Ward B it would get 60% of ward A’s score and 40% of ward B’s score.

Maps 

Across all four indicators, a higher score indicates higher levels of community need. These new indicators will not be shown on the Map by default, the Group Admin users can add these datasets to the maps using the Manage Indicators functionality. To do so, search the Unassigned theme for the indicator names, drag and drop them into a theme and then tick to show on the map.

Dashboard

All users can use the build a custom dashboard functionality to build dashboards that explore how different areas compare on these indicators. When building a custom dashboard, use the search bar to find the Community Needs Index indicators.

Reports

This new suite of indicators will be in any newly requested reports and can be found on page 70.

All Data Download

These indicators will also be added to the All Data Download in the next update which is due to take place at the end of November 2019.

Support

If you have any questions on these datasets, or suggestions for new ones to add, please get in touch on support@ocsi.co.uk