Statistics for libraries, registrations and archives

We have held the Customer Service Excellence Award continuously since 2010 and before that a Charter Mark since 1991. We currently hold 27 Compliance Plus points as part of the Customer Service Excellence Award, which signify best practice in many areas of Libraries, Registration and Archives.

Library statistics

Summary statistics - these figures reflect Libraries, Registration Archives’ output during 2022 to 2023.

  • Customers borrowed 5,231,000 items
  • 2,828,000 visits were made to our libraries
  • We had 116,000 active borrowers, plus 24,000 active e-borrowers
  • Books were delivered to 800 housebound customers
  • Customers made 1,297,000 online contacts
  • 756,700 e-books and e-audiobooks were borrowed by customers
  • 164,500 e-magazines were borrowed by customers
  • 1,092,000 e-newspapers were borrowed by customers
  • The top issuing adult fiction book for 2022 to 2023 was The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
  • The top issuing adult non-fiction book for 2022 to 2023 was The Salt Path by Raynor Winn
  • The top issuing children’s fiction book for 2022/23 was Ten Little Unicorns by Michael Brownlow
  • We had over 1,528,400 items for customers to borrow
  • Over 381,400 enquiries were responded to by library staff and the Ask a Kent Librarian team
  • Over 154,300 people attended our events and activities
  • Customers used our PCs for 152,200 hours, and our Wi-Fi service was accessed on 65,700 occasions.

Go to the libraries section of the website to find out how you can access these services.

These summaries show the rates of use for our library services in individual Kent districts:

Kent Archives statistics

The Kent Archives service is based in our Kent History and Library Centre. We have:

  • retrieved over 112,600 documents from our archives in order to carry out collection work and deal with customer enquiries
  • answered over 8,500 enquiries
  • welcomed 2,323 visitors to the Archive search room.

Registration

The registration service is available through our libraries and gateways. We have:

  • registered 17,300 births and 17,700 deaths
  • conducted 7,300 ceremonies
  • welcomed 2,834 new citizens to the United Kingdom.

Customer satisfaction

Our yearly surveys have found that a significant proportion of our customers have indicated that they were very satisfied or satisfied with our services:

  • libraries 94%
  • registration 95%

Archives and Records Association customer satisfaction survey

The ARA National Surveys, previously the Public Services Quality Group (PQSG), coordinates 2 important surveys for the sector:

  • the Survey of Visitors
  • the Distance Users of Enquiry Services Survey.

The surveys take place between September and November in alternate years, so each survey takes place every 2 years. We take part in the surveys to understand customers’ thoughts and to help shape the service with customer feedback. It also provides us with a benchmarking tool, comparing results across all archive services who take part in the survey.  In 2022 to 2023 the Survey of Visitors survey was carried out. Customer satisfaction with this service in Kent was 98%.

Read all previous results of the surveys.

Go to our Kent archives section of the website to find out how you can access these services.