19 June 2007 Improving the quality of business registers UNECE/Eurostat/OECD 18 – 19 June 2007

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 Description of SIRENE  SIRENE : –A national business register in which all businesses and their local units are registered. –Since 1994 : a unique identification number, at the core of the inter-administrative system –6.72 million businesses and 7.66 million local units  Content of SIRENE : –Identification data : civil status of businesses, legal form, the date it was set up and when it ceased trading –Address of local units –A code identifying the principal business activity carried out, number of employees –As SIRENE is used in the areas of statistics and trade : economic classification variables (list drawn up after consulting statisticians using the system)

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 From a product quality….  Quality = the “totality of characteristics of an entity that bear on its ability to satisfy stated and implied needs” : –Characteristics that are objective, but must be measured; –Purpose of these characteristics : to satisfy the needs of users.  A question not of maximum performance but of respecting specified performance (which depends on users).  Can be measured in different ways: enumeration of anomalies, evaluation of user satisfaction.

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 …. To a quality approach : how to ensure quality ?  A quality approach is based on : –a quality control (internal objective) : the company implements the necessary measures to ensure that the product has the desired characteristics –a quality assurance : it concerns the relationship with the customer, the confidence between customer and supplier.  All stages must be described in precise instructions : training of staff, involving them  Plan-Do-Check-Act (standard quality control strategy)  Temporal dimension

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 Inventory of requirements 1/2  Quality = users’ expectations  1 st use : Inter-administrative use –administrative partners involved in managing the register  registration at the earliest possible opportunity  unique identification number for each unit  consistency between SIRENE and the legal and administrative registers for businesses –requirements of businesses  the code describing their principal activity.  the reference to economic termination in the register.

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 Inventory of requirements 2/2  2 nd use : Dissemination of information  the “address” variable  a correct activity code and a reliable indication of the size  3 rd use : Statistical use –business demography (analysis of the economic climate, for instance monthly statistics for business start-ups) –basis for sampling  identification data and stratification of good quality.  metadata  a standard error of zero for the largest units (for all variables, including address, number of employees, etc.). –“survey” managers  When utilizing data from administrative sources or from surveys, statisticians may sometimes query data in the register.

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 Re-engineering SIRENE, taking quality into account  A few years ago : –a national quality mission (updating the activity code) –but obstacles : time-consuming but no visibility, role of SIRENE (both a system of inter-administrative regulations and a tool for business statistics)  Two aims in the register’s recent overhaul (SIRENE3) : –to reduce the number of managements tasks –to improve quality

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 The register’s recent overhaul (SIRENE3) 1/2  Taking quality into account in day-to-day management –A new workstation with automated processing capabilities (receiving standardized “administrative” information via telematics) which guarantees uniform processing, –Introduction of checks into the data-processing flow –For the great majority of data, existence of metadata (in order to date information, to provide an indicator of data quality or to specify its source).

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 The register’s recent overhaul (SIRENE3) 2/2  Taking quality into account as an “independent component” –INSEE performs operations unrelated to administrative requirements (known as “opérations qualité”)  at the initiative of register managers  at the request of those in charge of statistical operations. –The quality approach : no longer based only on a “national quality mission” but also including a local dimension (designation of a “quality manager” for each INSEE regional team).

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 Quality operations 1/2  Different ways of identifying targeted units : operations carried out –at the request of one of the register’s users (to clear up discrepancies or inconsistencies) –at the request of the register managers themselves (in a specific effort to improve the data available to users).  Different types of operation : –lists of units to be checked –register improvement surveys –mass updates –consistency with other registers

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 Quality operations 2/2  Periodicity of operations and how they are carried out –on a periodical basis (depends on user requirements and on the workload of SIRENE teams). –on a one-off basis –at first on a “one-off” basis and subsequently carried out periodically (a stock of units potentially unreliable is checked, then periodic checking prevents the formation of a new stock of potentially unreliable units).  A guaranteed response

Improving the quality of business registers June 2007 Volume and conclusion  Volumes of quality operations –210,000 legal units with their activity code updated-validated –15,000 units checked at the request of statisticians (wrong address, probable termination of business) –15,000 possible duplicate entries examined –45,000 units possibly misidentified as operational examined –3.5 million units (legal units or local units) with employee statistics and 2 million businesses with turnover statistics updated  Continuation : –still data populations that need to be checked, studied –the flexibility of the workstation enables further progress.