List of requirements

Based on the findings of this report, we have identified five requirements that ONS must fulfil to improve these statistics to the standards required by the Code: 

1. For transparency and to aid users in their use of the WAS statistics, ONS should publish information about the relative comparability of the different data sources it has used to triangulate the WAS.

2. Given the strength of user feedback about the lack of a back series and to improve users’ ability to compare data over time, ONS should review its decision not to publish the back series of data and either publish its plans for providing this data or explain to users why it is not doing so.

3. To improve its communication and engagement with users of the WAS, ONS should widen its user engagement and publish a stakeholder engagement plan. The stakeholder plan should set out how ONS will engage with a wide range of users when considering future changes to survey design or methods.

4. To help users make appropriate use of the data, ONS should improve its communication of data quality by:

• reviewing the material in the quality and methods information (QMI) report, updating it to reflect data concerns more transparently and improving the signposting between documents
• publishing confidence intervals on more-granular breakdowns

5. To produce the statistics to the quality that meet users’ needs, ONS should review the resource needs across the end-to-end production of wealth statistics, identify and prioritise plans for addressing gaps and communicate this transparently to users. ONS should regularly communicate any ongoing data quality concerns about the WAS to users, including its emerging concerns about round 9.