Producer Price Indices publication dates to change
Following an internal quality assurance review the Office for National Statistics (ONS) intends to push back the publication of its Producer Price Indices (PPI) statistical bulletin. From the September data release, which will be published on 16 October 2012, the Producer Price Indices releases will be published at the same time as the Consumer Price Indices and House Price Indices.
Explanation of New Dates
ONS regularly conducts reviews of the quality assurance processes in its publications, looking at whether they are sufficient and whether any changes should be made to minimise the risk of error. A recent review of the PPI publication processes found that the current tight timetable was increasing the risk of error.
The PPI statistical bulletin is released on the Friday of the first full week of each month; the statistical bulletin can be out five days after the end of the reference period. On occasions there is insufficient time to quality assure and publish the lower level PPIs in this time frame, which are currently published in the MM22 release the following Thursday.
By pushing back the publication date of the PPI statistical bulletin, ONS will be able to bring forward the MM22 publication and release all PPI data on the same day. ONS will also publish Price Index Numbers for the Aerospace Industries (MM19) publication at the same time.
From October 2012, the ONS inflation releases will be published alongside each other in their current format. Over the subsequent months there will be a programme of work to improve the coherence of the inflation releases; this will be done in consultation with the user community.
If you have any questions about the proposed change of publication dates for PPIs, please email: Business Price Statistics.
New publication dates
Current publication dates announced on the release calendar
The United Kingdom Statistics Authority has designated these statistics as National Statistics, in accordance with the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 and signifying compliance with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.
Designation can be broadly interpreted to mean that the statistics:
meet identified user needs;
are well explained and readily accessible;
are produced according to sound methods; and
are managed impartially and objectively in the public interest.
Once statistics have been designated as National Statistics it is a statutory requirement that the Code of Practice shall continue to be observed.
