Office for National Statistics

Short-Term Outputs for Production and Services

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Monthly Business Survey Turnover in Services Industries dataset. The estimates are for turnover based on data collected by the UK Monthly Business Survey (MBS). These estimates are published in £ millions on a monthly basis, covering all the territory of Great Britain without geographical breakdown, see link for data:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/datasets/monthlybusinesssurveymbsturnoverofservicesindustries

NACE Rev. 2.

The MBS survey for Services industries covers sectors G, H, I, J, M, N, P, R, S for NACE Rev 2. However, the data delivered to Eurostat covers sections G to N (G, H, I, J, M, N).

The definition of Turnover is:

Turnover comprises the totals invoiced by the observation unit during the reference period, and this corresponds to services supplied to third parties. Turnover also includes all other charges (transport, packaging, etc.) passed on to the customer, even if these charges are listed separately in the invoice.

Turnover excludes VAT and other similar deductible taxes directly linked to turnover as well as all duties and taxes on the goods or services invoiced by the unit. Reduction in prices, rebates and discounts as well as the value of returned packing must be deducted. Price reductions, rebates and bonuses conceded later to clients, for example at the end of the year, are not taken into account. Income classified as other operating income, financial income and extraordinary income in company accounts is excluded from turnover. According to this definition, the items generally excluded are:

— VAT and other similar deductible taxes directly linked to turnover all duties and taxes on the goods or services invoiced by the unit

— commissions,

— leases and rentals,

— leases for own production units and machines if used by third parties,

— leases of company-owned dwellings,

— receipts for licence-fees,

— receipts from staff facilities (for example from a factory canteen),

— the supply of products and services within the observation unit,

— sales of own land and fixed assets,

— sales or leases of own properties,

— sales of shares,

— interest receipts and dividends,

— other extraordinary income.

The above items may be included if they generate turnover in the principle field of operation of the observation unit.

The expressions ‘turnover’ and ‘sales’ are often used as synonyms in the context of short-term statistics. If subsidies on products are hard to measure they can be omitted for the purposes of calculating indices over time. National accounting rules should be used as guiding principles of what to include and to exclude.

 The enterprise or the activities of a specified list of local units belonging to an enterprise are used as the reporting unit. Very often the latter of these is close to the KAU. The observation unit is the same as the reporting unit. namely the enterprise or list of local units.

Businesses are drawn from a total number of 1.24 million businesses Approx, within the UK (production) and Great Britain (services) industries. The Inter Departmental Business Register (IDBR), the sampling database for business surveys, cover 99% of all economic activities in the UK and constantly updated to account for any current/future demographic changes.

The geographical area covered is Great Britain without geographical breakdown.

See information page on the release excel file:  https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/datasets/monthlybusinesssurveymbsturnoverofservicesindustries 

Not applicable

Turnover value in £ GBP millions (absolute values)

 Monthly

 The Monthly Business Survey data, feeding into the Monthly Business Survey Turnover of Services Industries are collected under the Statistics of Trade Act 1947. This act means that the provision of information is mandatory and fines are given to companies who refuse to provide this information. This is to avoid deterioration of response rates.

Not available

The United Kingdom Statistics Authority has designated these statistics as National Statistics in accordance with the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2009 and signifying compliance with the code of Practice for Official Statistics. Details of the policy governing the release of new data are available by visiting:

http://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/assessment/code-of-practice/

Statistical disclosure control methodology is applied to the MBS data. This ensures that information attributable to an individual or individual organisation is not identifiable in any published outputs. The Code of Practice for Official Statistics and specifically the Principle on Confidentiality set out practices for how we protect data from being disclosed. The Principle includes the statement that ONS outputs should “ensure that official statistics do not reveal the identity of an individual or organisation, or any private information relating to them, taking into account other relevant sources of information”.

http://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/assessment/code-of-practice/

The Monthly Business Survey Turnover for Services Industries are announced on the ONS release calendar and published as a dataset to accompany the Index of Services publication.   https://www.ons.gov.uk/releasecalendar

https://www.ons.gov.uk/releasecalendar

The data is released on the ONS website at 9:30 on the release date to all users alongside the Index of Services release. Data are sent to Eurostat using SDMX in line with Eurostat timetable requirements.  

Monthly

No news release or brief is produced or held for the Monthly Business Survey Turnover for Services industries. Reference tables are published on the ONS web site on the day of release.

Monthly Business Survey Turnover for Services Industries data reference tables are published on a monthly basis on the ONS official web-site, see following link:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/datasets/monthlybusinesssurveymbsturnoverofservicesindustries

Monthly Business Survey Turnover for Services Industries data reference tables are published on a monthly basis on the ONS official web-site, see following link:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/datasets/monthlybusinesssurveymbsturnoverofservicesindustries

Not available

 Data are sent to Eurostat to meet Eurostat timetable requirements. The Monthly Business Survey aggregates are published on the ONS website, alongside the Index of Services at 9.30am on previously announced dates on the release calendar

Documentation including articles on methodology and sources are published on the ONS website:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/methodologies/indexofservicesios

A summary quality report for the Monthly Business Survey (MBS) can now be found on the ONS website, see 'Quality and Methodology Information for the Monthly Business Survey, in the following link:

https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20160105161525/http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/search/index.html

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/uksectoraccounts/methodologies/indexofservicesqmi#overview-of-the-output

The UK Statistics Authority publishes a report on each assessment it carries out. Index of Services (implicitly MBS) was assessed as part of the Short term Economic output Indicators and the assessment can be found in the following link, report number 278.

https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publication/statistics-on-gdp-and-indices-of-production-and-services/

The Quality and Methodological Information report for MBS can be found here: https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/business/businessservices/methodologies/monthlybusinesssurveyqmi

Monthly Business Survey for Services Industries is intended to provide a general measure of monthly changes in the Turnover and has two primary uses:

• As a short-term economic indicator in its own right. The Government and Industries, among others, monitor the Monthly Business Survey as an important indicator of industrial activity

• As a requirement for the Statistical Offices of the European Community (Eurostat) – information on turnover and current price sales are provided to Eurostat

User Satisfaction was assessed as part of the UK Statistics Authority published assessments. In addition to face to face meetings with key stackholders. The Monthly Business Survey assessment is implicitly part of the short term economic output indicators assessment (Index of Production), see report number 278.

https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publication/short-term-economic-output-indicators-office-for-national-statistics/

All Short Term Statistics requirements are fulfilled

The target for clearance of MBS questionnaires per month is 75% of questionnaires, making up 80% of the turnover.

Sampling error occurs because estimates are based on a sample rather than a census. Sampling error of the main data source the MBS is measured internally at the point where results are made final and are passed for the purpose of estimating Monthly Business Survey for Services Industries. For the monthly turnover estimate for the whole of the MBS, coefficients of variation around 1.0 - 2.0% are usual. Coefficients of variation are calculated both at the sampled level of industry and at the aggregated level of industry that is published. High coefficients of variation are rare but are always investigated at the individual business level to determine the cause.

Non sampling errors- are not easy to quantify and include errors of coverage, measurement, processing and non-response. Various procedures are in place to ensure errors are minimised. Validation checks on data, for example percentage movements from month to month, are carried out to highlight unusual changes in turnover data. Disparities are investigated by contacting the business for clarification if necessary.  Another common cause of error is where a turnover value has been expressed in incorrect units (pounds rather than thousand pounds) and this has not been picked up during the data validation stage. Such errors are corrected and taken on as revisions during the next period, but if significant enough can be manually corrected in customers’ data. Editing rates give an indication of the cleaning applied to the data. Editing refers to the action of changing business level data either automatically, in the case of systematic errors, or after contacting the business to clarify suspect values.

Monthly target response rates for the MBS are 75% by number of questionnaires and 80% by register turnover; for the services industries. The MBS regularly exceeds these monthly targets.

The ONS National Statistics Release Calendar is available online and provides twelve months advanced notice of releases.  In the unlikely event of a change to the pre-announced release schedule, public attention should be drawn to the change and the reasons for the change should be explained fully at the same time, as set out in the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.

The Monthly Business Survey Turnover in Services Industries is published 9:30 am on the day of release.

These data comply with European System of Accounts 2010 and definitions are used in the production of these statistics.

Comparability over time is listed within the information page on the release, some of the industries, when introduced at a later point, were not included in previous totals.  This is clear in the information tab.

The data are derived from Monthly Business Survey (MBS). There is no internal comparable monthly source, but after two years when annual turnover becomes available from the Annual Business Survey (ABS), checks can be undertaken to ensure consistency between the 12 monthly returns and the data returns from large businesses.

User Satisfaction was assessed as part of the UK Statistics Authority published assessments. In addition to face to face meetings with key stackholders. The Monthly Business Survey assessment is implicitly part of the short term economic output indicators assessment (Index of Production), see report number 278.

https://www.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publication/short-term-economic-output-indicators-office-for-national-statistics/

Costs for compliance are published here: https://gss.civilservice.gov.uk/archive/about/surveys/survey-control-unit/online-list-of-government-statistical-surveys/index.html

For the Monthly Business Survey, the latest 13 periods (months) including the reference period are open for revision, i.e. T to T-12.  This is published in Monthly Business Survey Turnover for Services Industries.  This same revisions policy also applies to data submitted to Eurostat.

For the Monthly Business Survey, the latest 13 periods (months) including the reference period are open for revision, i.e. T to T-12

Monthly Business Survey

Monthly

Paper questionnaire, Telephone Data Entry and Electronic Questionnaire

The MBS uses an editing and validation approach known as selective editing. Selective editing is an internationally recognised method that uses a data based approach to assess the influence of business estimates on the aggregate outputs.

The Monthly Business Survey estimates are compiled using turnover reported by businesses, for small to medium sized businesses the results are grossed up using ratio estimation, with the Inter Departmental Business Register registered turnover being used as the auxiliary variable.  Large businesses are fully enumerated in the survey.

See annex.  This dataset is not adjusted, and working day adjusted only. Not seasonally adjusted

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