provide information Best Practice Template Experiences in Austria Wolfgang Bittermann Directorate Spatial Statistics Canberra 2 May 2011

2 | 28 October 2015 Executive Summary I am very much in favour with a comprehensive documentation like it is proposed in the “Best Practice Template”. We use it since 8 years but call it “Standard Documentation” and it is still under development Quality reports in a standardized format are very useful for both users and compilers In general the proposed “Best Practice Template” structure looks good but concerning some details improvements could help both users and compilers:  a clearer structure  by regrouping of topics and  by a higher degree of specification and clearer wording in some cases The 2 parts of my presentation  Our experience  Proposals for improvement

3 | 28 October 2015 The Austrian development : The Austrian Central Statistical Office was privatised and changed to Statistics Austria. 2000: The Statistical Council was founded and established the subgroup of quality assurance. 2002: System of detailed quality reports 2003: Standard documentation for all products 2003: Feedback talks based on standard documentation

4 | 28 October 2015 The Beginning Standard documentations existed already taking into account all (known) user needs, but not following a standardised format A quality reporting system following the definitional concepts of Eurostat was planned to be established 1. Introduction 2. Relevance 3. Accuracy 4. Timelines and Punctuality 5. Accessibility and Clarity 6. Comparability 7. Coherence 8. Additional aspects effecting quality

5 | 28 October 2015 The chosen Solution A standardized „compromise“ format for all statistical products 1. Important hints 2. General information 3. Statistical concepts, Methods 4. Statistical processing, Quality insurance 5. Publication (Accessibility) 6. Quality 6.1 Relevance 6.2 Accuracy 6.3 Timeliness and Actuality 6.4 Comparability 6.5 Coherence Feedback talks

6 | 28 October 2015 Adopting Energy Balance Report - a six Years Match 2003 Energy statistics was invited to present the Methodological Report on Energy balances as first accounting scheme in a feedback talk to the quality board  Therefore the report was (more or less) adopted to the standard format  No energy experts and users were invited to this feedback talk  The report was refused as not meeting the requirements of a quality report Six years of (step by step) adaptation 2009 Energy Statistics was invited again to a feedback talk  This time also the main users and energy experts were invited  After a heavy discussion the report was accepted with minor adoptions as compromise fulfilling all requirements of the Standard Quality Reporting Scheme

7 | 28 October 2015 The experiences The format is tailor made for surveys and primary statistics  The users were happy to get all information needed in a standardised and clear format  For the compiler it was helpful to get a complete overview and to have it handy in a manual For accounts like energy balances the format is problematical  The former standard report followed the balance structure and provided all background information needed in a logical order to the users  The new format contains a lot of aspects which are not relevant and its standardisation destroys the logical sequence.

8 | 28 October 2015 Lessons learned It is possible to adapt a methodological report on an accounting scheme to a standardized format tailor made for quality description of primary statistics. This adaptation presents also more comprehensive information to the readers than the former standard documentation, but it is more difficult to extract technical information needed by serious users. The report is available on the website of Statistics Austria ergy/energy_balances/index.html and includes hyperlinks to all other relevant quality reports available in English. ergy/energy_balances/index.html

9 | 28 October 2015 Proposal 1: Clearer structure General information Objective, purpose, history Contracting entity Main users Legal basis Statistical concepts and methodology Concepts and methodology Production, processing and quality assurance Publication Quality Relevance Accuracy Timeliness and punctuality Comparability Coherence Outlook

10 | 28 October 2015 Proposal 2: Deeper Specification and clearer wording (examples) National and international reporting instead of International reporting only Population could be split into Reporting unit and Respondents and Observed unit Collection of data could be split into Survey techniques, Survey questionnaires and Survey participation Additional documentation instead of Documentation only (this is the documentation!) Use the word flowchart instead of model in connection with illustration

11 | 28 October 2015 Proposal 3: Overview table

12 | 28 October 2015 Please address queries to: WOLFGANG BITTERMANN Contact information: Guglgasse 13, 1110 Vienna phone: +43 (1) fax: +43 (1) Best practice Template Experiences in Austria