However, in IdSurvey all types of quotas are represented in the same way. For stratified quotas, you need to set a quota for each combination of the intersection, either manually or in an Excel file.

Let’s use an example. We want to check the number of interviews collected by gender and cross (or stratify) by age groups. We also want to set independent quotas for the north, central, and south area.
For the stratified quotas based on gender and age group, it is necessary to set a single quota for each crossing by defining the criterion and the number of required interviews. In this example, we will therefore set a total of 10 quotas. For example, gender equal to M and range equal to Under 18, Gender equal to M and range equal to 18-29, and so on…

Let’s add the independent quotas for the three areas: North, Center, South.

Each completed interview will increase the counter of all quotas corresponding to the respondent’s characteristics. This means that a 25-year-old female respondent residing in the North zone will increase both the Females 18-29 and the North quota counters.

When any quota has reached the required number, all contacts matching that quota will be considered “out of quota,” even if other characteristics are compatible with other open quotas. This means that if the Center quota has been met, any additional Center respondent will be considered out of quota, even if the relevant gender and age group quota are still open.

Step 1
To create a quota click on the Tools menu and choose “Quotas Management”, then click on the + icon.
Step 2
Add a description, such as “Males” and enter the number of interviews desired for this quota, such as 250.
Step 3
Add the criteria by clicking the + icon of Set filters, choose the contact field(s), the type of comparison, and specify the value, e.g. Gender equals m.
Step 4
Click on save to confirm.

Import quotas from Excel files
Quotas can be imported from an Excel file.

Step 1
To add quotas via import, you need to create an Excel file containing the columns named as follows (following this exact order):

Description: insert the name of the quota with no spaces.
Field name(s) used to create the quota: enter the name of the field or fields (if it is a stratified quota) to enter the values.
Required: insert the number of completed interviews requested for the quota to be complete.

Step 2
Fill in the file with all the necessary quota information

Step 3
In IdSurvey, click on the gear button at the top left and then on “Import from file”

Step 4
Drag the file into the window or load it manually by clicking “Upload”.

Step 5
Press “Insert”, select the desired Excel sheet, and then click “Insert Data”.

Step 6
Repeat the procedure for all sheets in the Excel file you intend to import.

Quotas can refer to any field in the contact.
Contact field can be pre-loaded or collected during the interview process.

IdSurvey quotas cannot refer directly to questionnaire answers. However it is possible to populate contact fields during the interview.

For example, when asked “Select your gender” you will need to update the Gender field to either M, F or other values depending on the answer given so that the relevant quota can be processed.

Update a contact field with the user interface

Click on the gear button of the answer choice on which the quota will be based and enable the “Update Contact Field” function.
Select the contact field where the value will be written from the drop-down menu and type the value to be assigned in the text box below.

Update a contact field with IdCode

From IdCode, add /UF “Field = Value”in the desired answer option line, specifying the name of the field to be overwritten and the value to save.

Update a contact field with FlowScript

Using FlowScript, you can update a contact field by specifying any condition. For example, you can update a field if the respondent selected the first answer to question Q1 and indicated a grade greater than 6 in the open-ended question Q2.

For more details on using FlowScript, please refer to the specific article.

From “Advanced settings”, which you can find on the “general settings” page of the survey, you can choose between two different types of quota control, normal or strong.

“Normal” check: the quota check is carried out only at the beginning of the interview and in all the pages where you update a field used in quotas.
“Strong” check: the check is carried out after each page of the interview.

Whenever you change the quota criteria or the number of requested when a survey is already underway, you must run the “Recalculate All Cells” command to update the status of the contacts to the new settings.

When changes are made that make it necessary to recalculate cells, a reminder is shown at the top of the “Quota Management” page.

IdSurvey allows you to share the quota page with external users to track the progress of the survey.
No credentials are required to access the page. Anyone with the link can view the page. The shared page allows the real-time consultation of the progress for each quota and does not allow any kind of modification.

To share the quotas page, click on the gear button then select “Share” and copy the link from the dialog box, then share it via email or your preferred tool.

During the interview, contacts that are found to belong to a quota that has already been met will not be able to complete the interview and will be directed to a specific customizable exit page. These contacts are labeled with the outcome “Out of Quota”.

Contacts that belong to a full quota even before starting the interview (when the contact fields loaded match the criteria of a full quota), are ignored by the system and labeled as “Quota Full”. These contacts will not be proposed to telephone interviewers, CAPI interviewers, and ignored by email and SMS campaigns.

In rare cases, interviews belonging to quotas that have already been met may be collected. For example, it may happen when a quota needs only one interview to meet the goal and 2 interviews matching the quota requirements are completed simultaneously. In this case, one of the 2 interviews is considered “Over quota”. It is possible to exclude all over quota interviews from the data export.