1. Business Register as a basic tool for the production of statistics
International Roundtable on Business Survey Frames,
Wiesbaden, 21 – 26 October 2007
Session 5a, Benchmarking tools for Business Register

2. Helsinki In 2006: - Number of staff: 1087 (incl. interviewers: 232)
- Number of staff years: 946 fte (incl. interviewers: 141) - Education: 67 % at least tertiary level of education
- Age (on average):
47 years
- Females: 60 %
Population
5,2 million
Area
sq km
Helsinki
Tuula Viitaharju

3. Business Register functions
To be a survey frame and tool for data collection
To be a source of basic information of all relevant statistical units and to identify these units
To be a source of business demography statistics
To be a data source for fee-based information services
New features
globalisation
relationships with the business respondents
Tuula Viitaharju

4. Business Register coverage
Small and large business units
Central and local government units
Local kind-of-activity units (local KAUs)
Enterprise groups: all resident & truncated groups
The register covers all NACE sections:
active enterprises
active local units
Tuula Viitaharju

5. 3 populations Enterprises Local KAUs Enterprise Groups
Tuula Viitaharju

6. Enterprises in Finland 2005
Employment Number of Employment Turnover size class Enterprises
,8 % 44,1 % 33,3 %
,0 % 17,6 % 18,8 %
,2 % 38,4 % 47,9 %
Finnish enterprises in brief
Small number of large and complex enterprise
Large number of small and simple enterprises
Tuula Viitaharju

7. The production process of statistics in Statistics Finlandg h r f – D c E x p m s v S u W b P K I H R M O y F k , :
Tuula Viitaharju

8. The main reasons for using admin data are as follows
Reduction of the response burden of enterprises
Reduction of the costs of statistics
Increase the cost-effectiveness and coherence of statistics production
Offer users high quality statistics by using total populations and producing detailed classifications
Give the ability to compile small area statistics
Offers an extensive basis for revision analysis and the follow-up of statistics based on directly collected data
Tuula Viitaharju

9. Preconditions for using admin data
Legal
Principles of the Finnish Statistics act (2004):
It is compulsory to use existing data (if suitable)
Access to administrative files: government and social security institutions are obliged to deliver their data to Statistics Finland
Free of charge, compensation of direct cost
ID-system
General Business ID
Tuula Viitaharju

10. Business registration in Finland
Responsible bodies: jointly Finnish Tax Administration and the National Board of Patents and Registration
General register of businesses and corporations: Business Information System, BIS
unique Business Identity Code (Business ID)
some basic data like name, legal form, address, home municipality, industry code
legal register (Act 244/2001)
service is open to everyone on Internet (htpp: (Finnish, English, Swedish)
Tuula Viitaharju

11. Statistical Business Register of Statistics Finland
Sources
administrative sources, other mass data (private)
direct data collection, BR surveys
data estimation
feedback information from other surveys & integrated data collection
Updating frequency
monthly, annual
annual data for each statistical year (t) are completed in 10 months => by the end of October (t+1)
Tuula Viitaharju

12. BR data collection BR direct data collection is necessary since
BR receives the legal units from Tax Administration
but local units, local KAUs are maintained only by the statistical Business Register of Statistics Finland
Tuula Viitaharju

13. Business Register Surveys (1)
Multi-site enterprises
6 000 enterprises, local KAUs
survey jointly with Regional Employment Statistics
updates Local KAUs structure of the enterprise
links persons to Local KAUs
Tuula Viitaharju

14. Business Register Surveys (2)
One-site enterprises
sample of enterprises (allocated in 3 surveys in a year)
Quality survey: small enterprises, sample (3 surveys a year)
New enterprises
enterprises, significant units according to size of monthly data accumulation
continual phone profiling, approximately the 300 largest new legal units per year
NACE implementation means larger surveys
Tuula Viitaharju

15. Business Register Surveys (3)
Questionnaires on paper (pre-printed questionnaires)
printing out and reception services are outsourced
Phone profiling for major structural changes
Electronic data collection via Internet was started in 2006
Tuula Viitaharju

16. The BR administrative sources & data providers
Tax files
The Customer Register of the Tax Administration
Business Taxation data (accounting data)
VAT and PAYE registers, monthly
Employer’s annual notifications
Files of the National Board of Patents and Registration
Files of the National Board of Customs
Files of the Bank of Finland
Population Register Center (Register of Buildings and Dwellings)
Files of the State Treasury
Files of the Local Government Pensions Institution
Tuula Viitaharju

17. Customer Register of National Board of Taxes
Main source of BR population, monthly updates
New legal units, Business ID
Updating data for the existing units, information on
Business ID, names
postal and location addresses, home municipality
start / cessation of legal unit
legal form, activity code
relationship between legal units, mergers etc.
Tuula Viitaharju

18. Business taxation data file (accounting data)
Variables from financial statement & balance sheet
Agreement of common data content between Tax administration and Statistics Finland
file contains appr. 200 variables
covers all Finnish businesses
main source for SBS statistics
BR exploits turnover, sum of wages and salaries
Tuula Viitaharju

19. Payment control register for VAT and employer contributions
Variables from monthly VAT and social security payments
Monthly transmission from Tax administration to Statistics Finland (each transmission includes 7 latest months)
covers all employers and VAT units
main source for STS statistics
BR exploits monthly sales, sum of wages and salaries => fast size approximation (turnover, employment), birth and death expectation, tool for phone profiling
Tuula Viitaharju

20. Annual PAYE data (pay-as-you-earn)
Employer’s annual notifications
covers all employers
individual wages and salaries of all employees
source for various social and population census statistics
BR exploits sum of wages and salaries =>
update of the variable in BR: sum wages and salaries
update of the variable in BR: number of employees (employment estimation by using wage model and the individual wages and salaries of each employee)
Tuula Viitaharju

21. Private mass data providers
The National Post Company
Address database - all genuine addresses in Finland
for checking the address format
for defining location municipality
Address files of the National Post company
Company addresses (street + number, postal code)
Suomen Asiakastieto (a private data house and rating company)
Enterprise Group data
Invest in Finland
Foreign ownership
Tuula Viitaharju

22. The use of administrative data is still increasing
Tax files
Ownership data (stored since 2006)
subsidiaries
Partnership members and shares of participation
for Enterprise Groups
for updating data on entrepreneurship
Information Centre of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry
link between Business Register and farm register
Tuula Viitaharju

23. Statistical Business Register
Tuula Viitaharju

24. Use of BR data in Statistics Finland
BR service database is available to everyone working for Statistics Finland
autonomous use (batch, on-line)
supported by BR metadata (variable descriptions, process descriptions, time tables of planned updatings and reports of realised updatings)
In Future
moving towards integrated processes
more pressure to use only Business Register classifications in all statistical systems of Statistics Finland
Tuula Viitaharju

25. Some examples of integrating processes
Business Register - Regional employment statistics:
joint data collection of multi-site large enterprises
BR/ Enterprise Group Register - inward FATS:
co-operation in data collection concerning foreign owned enterprises
treatment of complex cases and methodology
Business Register - STS
follow-up of structural changes, media etc
Tuula Viitaharju

26. Register of enterprise respondents - enlargement of the Business Register
Established in 2006
Located in the BR unit
Operates as an inner service register of statistics, also respondents get information of the inquiries they are picked up
Part of the program leadership: enterprise respondent programme
Tuula Viitaharju

27. Business surveys Altogether about 60 direct surveys
More information on surveys:
Business surveys
Income and expenditure of foreign sea transport
Information technology and electronic commerce in enterprises
Innovation survey
Inquiry for industrial establishments (T5)
Inquiry on cost indices
Inquiry on incentive stock options
Inquiry on manufacturing commodities
Inquiry on new orders in manufacturing
Inquiry on postal and small freight deliveries
Inquiry on private sector wages and salaries
Inquiry on volume index of industrial output
Inventory inquiry
Job vacancy survey
Monthly inquiry for accommodation statistics
Monthly inquiry for iron and steel statistics
Mutual fund inquiry
Outstanding credit
Periodic survey of motor vehicle trade
Periodical regional survey of trade
Periodical survey of retail trade
Periodical survey of wholesale trade
Price inquiry on producer price indices for manufactured products
Producer price indices for services
Quarterly inquiry on international trade in services
Quarterly inquiry on labour costs
Regional outstanding credit
Renovation building of construction enterprises
Renovation building of housing corporations
Sales inquiry
Statistics on agriculture
Statistics on goods transport
Telecommunications inquiry
The inquiry on financial accounts
Altogether about 60 direct surveys
Annual inquiry on foreign trade in services
Authority (Virati) data collections (A and T data collections)
Building cost index
Business Register inquiry for multi-establishment enterprises
Business Register inquiry for new enterprises
Business Register inquiry for single-establishment enterprises
Business Register inquiry for small single-establishment enterprises
Business services
CVTS, Continuing Vocational Training Survey
Credit cards
Data collection on occupations
Data collection on personnel of multi-establishment enterprises for employment statistics
Energy production inquiry
Energy use in manufacturing
Enterprises' research and development
Environmental protection expenditure in industry
Finance of housing corporations
Financial leasing inquiry
Financial statements inquiry for enterprises (TILKES)
Financial statements of mutual funds and investment management companies
Forest workers' wages
Tuula Viitaharju

28. Business surveys according to enterprise size class, in 2007
Enterprise respondents in total enterprises, 12 % of all enterprises - 66 % of enterprises received one inquiry - 90 % of enterprises that employ over 250 persons, got at least one inquiry - 6 enterprises answered to more than 20 inquiries - biggest amount of different sheets to one enterprise was nearly 300
Tuula Viitaharju

29. Strategic goals for Business Register
Globalisation - to cover MNEs and international co-operation
means in improving coherence
efficiency of production - the BR as a common frame of business statistics
enlarge the scope of Business Register - new variables
a more real time Business Register with interactive nature
=> BR data system has to be redesigned, the work will start next year
Tuula Viitaharju

30. The System of Economic Statistics
International statistical system
Environmental statistics
Business statistics (STS, SBS)
Labour statistics
Government finance
National accounts
Foreign trade
Prices and costs
Other economic statistics
Business register
Economic statistics
Science, technology, innovation
Operating environment
Social statistics
Tuula Viitaharju

31. Thank you for your attention ! tuula.viitaharju@stat.fi