Business Register: Quality Practices

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Business RegisterQuality Practices

• Eddie Salyers
• Eddie.Joe.Salyers_at_Census.GOV
• 301-763-2638

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An Assessment of Current Quality Assurance
Practices and Ongoing Work to Develop a
Comprehensive Quality Plan for the U.S. Census
Bureau Business Register
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Business RegisterQuality Practices

• Introduction
• Database Redesign
• Quality Assurance Team
• Business Register Overview
• Quality Assurance
• Migration
• Administrative Records
• Census Bureau Data Collections
• Recommendations
• Conclusion

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BR Database Redesign

• Complete redesign
• Old Standard Statistical Establishment List
  (SSEL) VAX RDB
• New Business Register (BR) Oracle
• All software rewritten
• New BR production Fall 2002

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Quality Assurance Team

• Mission
• Assure the quality of the new BR is a minimum
  commensurate with the old SSEL which it replaces,
  and to establish a complete quality framework.

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Quality Assurance Team

• Definitions
• Quality "The totality of features and
  characteristics of a product or service that bare
  on its ability to satisfy specified or implied
  needs." (ISO, 1986).
• Reliability - The ability of a system or
  component to perform its required functions under
  stated conditions for a specified period of
  time. IEEE 90.
• Integrity - Information in the system follows
  designated standards and is consistent both
  within an individual table as well as between
  associated tables.

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Business Register Overview

• Primary Functions
• Economic Census enumeration list
• Survey sampling frames
• Central storage of administrative data
• Control file for data collection/processing
• Data for statistical products
• Data for economic research

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Key Concepts and Definitions

• The BRs Units
• Business/Statistical
• Establishment
• Enterprise
• Enterprise segment
• (e.g., alternate reporting unit)
• Administrative
• EIN unit
• SSN unit

Standard Statistical Units

Variable

Mainly for IRS tax reporting
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Business Organization

• Basic Types
• Single-establishment enterprise
• An enterprise that operates just one
  establishment (i.e., at one physical location) -
  a single unit or SU
• Multi-establishment enterprise
• An enterprise that operates two establishments or
  more (2-plus locations)

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Multiunit

• A more complex MU may have
• Multiple EIN units
• One subsidiary enterprise or more

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Complex Multiunits

• The largest U.S. Multi-units may have
• Several thousand EINs
• More than 10,000 establishments

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System

• Oracle Database
• Many Related Tables
• Interactive Web-Based Interface built with Oracle
  Forms PL/SQL
• Interface used for research and updates
• Software for interactive and batch updates and
  edits

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Migration

• Complete Redesign
• New IDs
• New Table Structures
• All New Software
• Copy Existing data - 2001
• Load new data - 2002

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Migration

• Quality Checks
• Create SAS Datasets from Old SSEL and New BR for
  2001 Records
• Record to Record Match of 2001 SSEL and 2001 BR
• After accounting for differences cause by design
  no significant differences were found
• Comparison of 2001 BR to 2002 BR
• Checks both migration and software used to load
  2002 records
• Year to Year Changes as Expected

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Administrative Records

• Internal Revenue Service
• Business Master File (BMF)
• Payroll tax returns
• Business income tax returns
• Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)
• Description Industrial classification assigned
  by State Employment Security Agencies as part of
  Covered Employment and Wages
• Social Security Administration
• Applications for new Employer Identification
  Number (EIN)

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Administrative Records

• Over 100 Million administrative records are
  received each year.

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Administrative Records Quality Assurance

• Current Practices
• Stage 1
• Tabulate distributions of variables on incoming
  files and compare to expected values.
• Unchanged with redesign, works on inputs
• Stage 2
• Basic Validity Test Edits to assure each item
  has a valid form (valid states, data type, etc.)
• Ratio Edits Examine Consistency of correlated
  data, I.e. Payroll per employee
• Data failing edits are replaced with imputed
  values and referred to an analyst for review
• Done as part of load to BR database
• Process is similar to old, but all software
  rewritten for new BR

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Administrative Records Quality Assurance

• Current Practices
• Strengths
• Identifies systematic file errors well
• Weaknesses
• Lack of Macro-Level Post Processing Quality
  Assurance
• Communication
• Identifying significant problems with large cases

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Administrative Records Quality Assurance

• Recommendations
• Using SAS datasets that are created monthly from
  the BR perform a routine macro-level review.
• Creation of a Centralized Administrative Record
  Tracking System
• Standardization and Automation of all Current QA
  Reports
• Increase Ability to Identify Important Companies
  with Missing or Inaccurate Administrative Records
• Development of Systematic Review of
  Post-Processing Administrative Record QA
• Monitor Cost of Current Administrative Record
  Quality Assurance Activities

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Census Bureau Data Collections

• Company Organization Survey
• Description Register proving survey directed to
  selected multiunit enterprises
• Content
• Ownership or control by a United States parent
• Ownership or control by a foreign parent
• Inventory of establishments, verifying or
  collecting the following for each
• Primary and secondary name
• Physical location
• EIN used for payroll tax reporting
• SIC
• Employment for pay period including March 12
• First quarter and annual payroll
• Year-end operating status

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Census Bureau Data Collections

• Economic Census
• Description Enumeration of establishments in
  covered industries
• Content for each establishment
• Ownership or control by a parent enterprise
• Locations of operation
• Primary and secondary name
• Physical location address
• EIN used for payroll tax reporting
• SIC and Type of Operation
• Employment for pay period including March 12
• First quarter and annual payroll
• Dollar volume of business (value of shipments,
  sales, receipts, revenue)
• Year-end operating status
• Value of products and services by category
  (selectively)
• Other industry-specific content

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Census Bureau Data Collections Quality Assurance

• Current Practices
• Data Entry
• Independent Verification of samples
• Data are re-keyed and difference adjudicated
• Lots accepted or rejected based on error rates.
• Batch Update Operations
• Basic Validity Test Edits to assure each item
  has a valid form (valid states, data type, etc.)
• Ratio Edits Examine Consistency of correlated
  data, I.e. Payroll per employee
• Data failing edits are replaced with imputed
  values and referred to an analyst for review
• Done as part of load to BR database
• Process is similar to old, but all software
  rewritten for new BR

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Census Bureau Data Collections Quality Assurance

• Current Practices
• Clerical Operations
• A second person that is qualified as a verifier
  selects and inspects a sample of the referrals
  from each completed work unit (dependent
  verification)
• Rejected work units subjected to 100
  re-inspection
• Note old SSEL had functionality to hold
  corrections until they passed inspections

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Additional QA Team Recommendations

• Improve Error Tracking
• Improve Imputation for missing Employment and
  Payroll Values
• Evaluate ORACLE DQI (Data Quality Inspector) as
  way to identify problems
• Expand use of SAS datasets built from the BR to
  assess quality
• Review and documentation of user needs and how
  the BR meets those needs
• Comparison to Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)
  Business Establishment List (BEL)-

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Conclusion

• No identifiable difference in quality of new BR
  and old SSEL
• Most procedures remain same
• Migration completed accurately
• Concerns
• Clerical processing
• Dependence on staff expertise
• Several Areas for Potential Improvements