1. The Dutch BR and profiling
Jean Ritzen
Statistics Netherlands
19th International Roundtable on Business Survey Frames
Oct 19, 2005
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2. Top-Down Profiling in the Netherlands
Important source for this presentation:
Top-Down Profiling in the Netherlands
Peter Struijs
Statistics Netherlands
Workshop on Profiling, Heerlen, 2-3 June 2005
Oct 19, 2005
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3. Content The Dutch BR in general Why profiling? Context of profiling
New profiling instructions
delineation of the enterprise group
the operational structure of the enterprise group
delineation of the enterprises
linking enterprises to administrative units
Conclusion: recommended practices
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4. Some figures (1)
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5. Oct 19, 2005
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6. Some figures (2)
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7. Some figures (3)
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9. Sources for BR updating
In use:
Single (administrative) business register
Chambers of commerce
Taxation autorities
Social security
(All above are administrative (legal or fiscal) oriented)
Feed back from surveys
Potential additional information
Dun and Breadstreet
Internet
Other
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10. Oct 19, 2005
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11. Updating Strategy Effort depends on statistical impact of units
More effort for complex units
Respond to problems: respondent requests, questions from statistical departments, processing signals
4500 units in scope of “profiling”, active or reactive; 18 staff (2005)
Method: bottom-up profiling
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13. Some more figures Registered units in the SN-BR:
Source units: about 2 million
Legal units: about 1.5 million
Enterprises: about 960 thousand
Enterprise groups: 915 thousand
Published number of enterprises about 715 thousand (among other reasons because of correction estimates)
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14. Profiling large enterprise groups
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15. A case, source: newspaper
Dsm.com
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16. Why Profiling?
Administrative data sources track administrative units, not enterprises
Many large enterprises are constructions because of:
taxation
payroll & social security
liability
control
subsidies
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17. Benefits of Profiling Higher quality of statistics
Lower response burden
International comparability
Compliance with EU law
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18. “Profiling” Results in today BR
legal units enterprise groups enterprises
20 – 29  
30 – 39  
40 –  
60 – 99  
100 and more  
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19. Need for Change Changes in data sources: Quality concerns:
new administrative register with unique identification of businesses
availability of internet
Quality concerns:
results not plausible in some cases
methods not uniformly applied
need to measure profiling quality
Need for higher efficiency
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20. Two Approaches to Profiling (1)
Bottom-up approach:
Start with legal units and build enterprises
Top-down approach:
Start with the enterprise group and divide it into enterprises; then relate them to legal units
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21. Two Approaches to Profiling (2)
Bottom-up and top-down approach compared:
Top-down approach more efficient:
number of legal units may be very large
administrative data: timelag and quality problem
Risk of bias with bottom-up approach:
do the enterprises recognise themselves?
response problems
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22. Top down profiling: preamble
Start profiling of multinational enterprise groups from a global perspective!
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23. Top-Down Profiling: Step 1
Aim: delineate the enterprise group
All resident legal units linked by direct or indirect control
Sources: administrative data, financial reports, statistical departments
For step 1 no contact with respondent
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24. Source problems in defining the group, some examples
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25. Source problems in defining the group, some examples (2)
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26. Top-Down Profiling: Step 2
Aim: investigate operational structure
Aspects:
operational entities (internet!)
flows of goods and services (internal and external)
degree of autonomy
availability of accounts
But: try to ignore the administrative structure!
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27. Top-Down Profiling: Step 3
Aim: delineate the enterprises
Steps:
identify market-oriented operational entities (orientation to outside the group)
form clusters of such entities based on operational dependence
allocate all other operational entities to these clusters
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28. Top-Down Profiling: Step 4
Aim: link enterprises with administrative units
Possible relationships:
one to one
enterprise consists of several adm units
enterprise is part of adm unit
many to many
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29. Oct 19, 2005 RT19, Profiling Ent 1 Ent 2 EG 1 SU11B LU 2 JLU3 LU 4
Source 1
BSource2
Source 3
Source 4
SU 6
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30. Communication with Enterprise group
Check results with group at high level
Are the conclusions of the profile actions in line with EG-perception
Make in co-operation with statistical departments arrangements on the statistical units and collection of data
Be aware of continuity effects related with changes in the structuring of units
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31. Quality Aspects Profile report: Test of new method showed that:
standardised
exhaustive information on the four steps
strict separation of facts and conclusions
Test of new method showed that:
the method works
method is complex (good instructions and training needed)
profile report must concentrate on changes
profilers need good data access
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32. Recommended Practices
Apply top-down profiling to the enterprise groups with the highest statistical impact
Take an economic, not an administrative approach
Centralise profiling activities, based on central data access
Centralise data collection on largest enterprise groups and register all contacts centrally
Base quality control on standardised profiling reports
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33. And globally?
Strong need for a harmonised interpretation of the definition of the enterprise group and of the enterprise
Strong need for a broad harmonised quality policy for statistical units
Meanwhile: development and share of best practices Started initiatives in European context
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