Official Statistics

Quality report: Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin

Updated 7 June 2021

© Crown copyright 2021

This publication is licensed under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.0 except where otherwise stated. To view this licence, visit nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3 or write to the Information Policy Team, The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: psi@nationalarchives.gov.uk.

Where we have identified any third party copyright information you will need to obtain permission from the copyright holders concerned.

This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/quality-report-hydrocarbon-oils-duties-bulletin/quality-report-hydrocarbon-oils-bulletin

1. Introduction

This quality report relates to the Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin National Statistics. The purpose is to provide users with information about the quality of the outputs as set out by the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.

The Oils Bulletin has been published since September 2016 and on GOV.UK since September 2020.

Archive versions of the Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin published on GOV.UK after September 2020 are no longer hosted on GOV.UK and are instead available via the UK Government Web Archive, from the National Archives.

Archive versions of the Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin published between 2008 and September 2020 are found on the UK Trade Info website.

The bulletin contains statistics on historical receipts and liabilities for all hydrocarbon oils duties.

Accompanying these statistics is commentary intended to explain trends to users and how these trends interact with external events, oils duty rates and other oils policies in the UK.

Included duty receipts statistics and statistics relating to liabilities and production are up to the latest full month before the bulletin release.

Liabilities statistics relate to when traders accrue tax liabilities through the provision of a service.

The bulletin is produced by analysts in the Knowledge Analysis and Intelligence (KAI) directorate of HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC). Thorough quality assurance (QA) procedures are followed for each bulletin before it is signed off by senior management, then sent to the HMRC GOV.UK communications team for publication.

2. Relevance

The Oils Bulletin contains data on historical liabilities, receipts and duty rates of oils duties in the UK. The bulletin makes it clear that it contains information only about oils duties on which duty has been paid.

The Oils Bulletin is a National Statistics publication and contains a commentary section on recent patterns in total oils receipts and receipts by products over the previous 3 financial years (including the current year). It also contains a commentary section on trends in receipts of petrol and diesel over the previous 10 years.

The commentary and content of the bulletin are regularly reviewed to ensure they remain relevant to user needs.

3. Accuracy and reliability

The data used to produce these publications is exhaustive, and covers all types of oils sold under UK jurisdiction which is subject to excise duty. This means that data on liabilities and receipts refers to all oils sold legally.

Deferments and late returns can influence the data used for the publications. For that reason, the last 3 months of data at any given time are labelled as ‘provisional’, although revisions tend to be minor. Where there are revisions they are clearly marked as ‘revised’, and information is given as to the reasons and scale of the revisions if appropriate.

4. Timeliness and punctuality

The bulletin is published one month after the end of the reporting period for receipts. That is, the bulletin relating to oils duty received in January is published at the end of February. The bulletin takes around one week to produce, with the data not being available until after the middle of the month. The remaining time is spent quality assuring the information in the bulletin.

In line with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics, these statistics are pre-announced on GOV.UK.

HMRC also publishes an annual publication plan on GOV.UK.

There have been no incidents of late publication of the bulletin since the previous Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin Quality Report was produced in 2013 which is available through the UK Government Web Archive from the National Archive.

5. Accessibility and clarity

The data is publicly available within the Oils Bulletin page and is published at 9.30 am on the pre-announced date of release.

The Oils Bulletin commentary is published in accessible Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) format, as generated within internal UK government HTML Markdown software. The Oils Bulletin data tables which accompany the commentary are published in accessible Open Document Spreadsheet (ODS) format.

Accompanying the bulletin is a background and references document which includes:

  • definitions for oils duties and products

  • details on how oils duties are levied and paid

  • methodology for producing oils duties statistics

  • statistical quality information, including HMRC’s rounding policy

  • hyperlinks to relevant pages where bulletin users can find more information

There is also an historical oils duty rates document.

Both historic duty rates and background and references are published in HTML format.

Following major changes in September 2020, substantial formatting changes were made to the Oils Bulletin to ensure alignment with accessibility regulations for digital content from public bodies as legislated within the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

This reformatting of the Oils Bulletin formed part of HMRC’s wider accessible documents policy. Changes made to the Oils Bulletin included:

  • replacement of Portable Document Format (PDF) files previously used for statistics commentary with HTML documents for the same purpose

  • migration of all oils duties background, references and rates information from Microsoft Excel tables to HTML documents

  • migration of data tables from Microsoft Excel to ODS format

  • simplification of language used to avoid jargon and clear explanations used to describe all non-decorative features

An accessibility report was first produced to identify required format changes. The overriding aim of this reformat was to improve how perceivable, operable, understandable and robust the Oils Bulletin is for all users, in line with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.1) design principles for accessibility.

6. Coherence and comparability

By definition, there are no other sources that allow a comparison with the data in the bulletin (since HMRC is the only organisation which collects and estimates duty paid and the associated liabilities).

The data used to compile the Oils Bulletin comes from several sources:

  • Customs and Excise Core Accounting System (CECAS)

  • Pentaho

  • Enterprise Tax Management Platform (ETMP)

These are all used to extract Hydrocarbon Oils duty receipts data. This data is based upon information submitted by taxpayers on HO10 forms.

Comparability over time of duty rates and receipts at constant prices is reliant upon the deflator used. HMRC uses the Inflation and price indices series published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), and values are therefore subject to any biases this series might present.

Liability statistics relate to when traders accrue tax liabilities through the provision of a service.

Data within the bulletin relates to the UK as a whole and cannot be disaggregated into lower geographical breakdowns, and are therefore not affected by changes in geographies.

7. Trade-offs between output quality components

Since the data relates to all oils on which duty is paid to HMRC, in general there have been no trade-offs which have necessitated balancing different aspects of quality.

8. Assessment of user needs and perceptions

The demand for the Oils Bulletin is measured by the number of unique page views which represents the number of visits during which the page was viewed at least once. Within the financial year ending in 2021, there were 855 unique page views.

Over time the Oils Bulletin has evolved as a result of information found out through consultations and surveys:

  • there was a user engagement survey in 2010 which led to some changes to the bulletin (for example consolidating into one bulletin and including historical data)

  • following this and the 2012 UKSA report, further changes were made to the bulletin, which included added commentary, graphs and background information

The Oils Bulletin was up for consultation in the 2021 survey. It will not be reduced from a quarterly stagger but will instead be published in June, and September in 2021 and then January, April, July, and October on a regular basis from 2022.

9. Performance, cost and respondent burden

The quarterly update to the Bulletin takes up to 4 working days in total for the main analyst to complete and receive QA from other analysts, the team leader, and the person signing off the release. The annual cost, therefore, is around 16 days a year (4 days per bulletin completed 4 times a year).

There is no respondent burden since the data is taken from administrative sources which are used by taxpayers to make their usual returns to HMRC.

10. Confidentiality, transparency and security

Before going live, the bulletin is classified as pre-released National Statistics, and is therefore subject to a restricted protective marking when referred to in email correspondence and is subject to the Code of Practice for Official Statistics, which is strictly enforced.

Contents