If you have looked at last year’s Nobel prize winners work in economics you will realize that it is heavily dependent on good quality primary data that is collected through in-person household interviews in developing countries. Over the last few weeks, as the COVID-19 crisis escalated, most researchers (including J-PAL) have suspended in-person field activities for now. This poses huge challenges for those who have data collection efforts planned this year, especially for junior faculty on a tenure clock. And phone surveys seem like a great alternative for these unique and difficult times. J-PAL has shared an excellent post here on best practices for phone surveys and has curated a list of strategies for improving survey response rates on the phone that include suggestions such as building a brand around the phone number, protocols for failed call attempts, making participation attractive through mobile money or airtime, random digit dialing, to name a few. These are great suggestions for researchers who plan to conduct phone surveys during ‘normal times’.