Quality management at the INE

The INE bases its quality management system on elements:

Institutional structure

An institutional structure specifically created and dedicated to quality management. It is composed of:

• Quality Unit: specialized administrative unit in charge of the management and design of quality procedures.
• Quality Committee: collegiate body for quality management.

Set of policies and actions

A set of policies and actions to ensure compliance with the European Statistics Code of Practice (ESCoP) and implement the procedures foreseen in the European Union Common Quality Assurance Framework (QAF).

• Artificial Intelligence Policy Statement
• Charter of services

• Policies regarding the dissemination of results
  • • Dissemination policy
    • Confidentiality policy
    • Distribution of statistical results subject to a news embargo
• Revision policy

  • Revisions in the data are an inherent practice in the production of statistics, for two main types of reasons:

    • Ordinary or routine reviews. For some statistics, where users particularly value the prompt availability of data, initial estimates are published with the expectation that they can be revised and updated when new data become available. This is typical of short-term statistics, such as monthly or quarterly statistics.
    • Major revisions. Revisions are also due to changes in data sources, in concepts, definitions and classifications or due to improved methodological procedures. By their nature, these revisions have a greater impact on the data, although they also occur less frequently.

    There are also other, unplanned, data revisions due to the need to correct errors in previously disseminated statistics. Indeed, despite the quality control procedures and measures taken, errors in published information are inevitable: this leads to unplanned or extraordinary revisions.

    The general INE Revision Policy document approved at the meeting of the Governing Board held on 13 March 2015, establishes common criteria and standards for INE statistics when making revisions to published data, for any of the aforementioned reasons. With the approval of this policy, the INE responds to the requirements of transparency and information to users, recommended in the European Statistics Code of Practice.

    It should be noted that, at the INE, there are specific revision policies for different statistical operations, in some cases defined in the corresponding European regulations. (Details on existing review policies in specific fields can be found on the websites of each set of statistics. A summary of the criteria used is included in the Standardised Methodological Reports - sections 19.1 and 19.2).

    However, a homogeneous global framework establishing common rules and principles for the whole of INE's production was lacking, a gap that is filled by this general Revision Policy document.

• Other documentation and useful links

  • National

    INE documents:

    • Articles from the Revista Estadística Española: Good practices in Official Statistics
    • Working document
    • INE's response to the recommendations of the AIREF included in the Report on the main lines of government budgets 2020

    International

    • Eurostat: Quality
    • European quality conferences
    • Eighth European Conference on Quality in Official Statistics
    • United Nations (UN): National Quality Assurance Frameworks

Quality monitoring and evaluation system

A quality evaluation and monitoring system composed of a series of instruments and methods to measure the quality of statistical work.

• INE quality guidelines

• Priority quality indicators

  • Quality indicators are summary measures of the main quality components, applicable to most statistical products and/or procedures developed following the criteria established by Eurostat, ESS guidelines for the implementation of the ESS quality and performance indicators). Part of these indicators is available to users, as they have been integrated into the Standardised Methodological Report which is published for each statistical operation of the INE.

    • R1 Rate of available statistical data
    • A1 Coefficient of variation
    • A4 Non-response rate
    • A5 Non-response by concept
    • A6 Average size of revisions
    • TP2 Time between the reference period and the publication date of the final results
    • TP3 Punctuality
    • CC2 Comparable length for time series
• Standardised Methodological Reports

  • The INE publishes the Standardised Methodological Reports following the European standard for the communication of methodological characteristics. In fields 11 to 19, these reports show different aspects of the quality of the products and include indicators such as the rate of non-response, size of revisions, variation coefficient, etc.