2001R2163 — EN — 01.01.2008 — 001.001

This document is meant purely as a documentation tool and the institutions do not assume any liability for its contents

Amended by:

▼B

COMMISSION REGULATION (EC) No 2163/2001

of 7 November 2001

concerning the technical arrangements for data transmission for statistics on the carriage of goods by road

(Text with EEA relevance)

Article 1

The technical format for the transmission of data to the Commission (Eurostat) is defined in the Annex to this Regulation.

Member States shall use this format for the data concerning the 2002 reference year and subsequent years.

Article 2

Member States shall transmit to the Commission (Eurostat) the data and metadata required by this Regulation in electronic form, in conformity with an interchange standard proposed by the Commission (Eurostat).

Article 3

This Regulation shall enter into force on the 20th day following its publication in the Official Journal of the European Communities.

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

ANNEX

TECHNICAL FORMAT FOR DATA TRANSMISSION

1.   DATA STRUCTURE

The individual data records for each quarter, which are to be sent to Eurostat, shall consist of three linked data sets covering:

Each A1 ‘vehicle record’ is linked to 1-n ‘journey records’ (A2 data set) which contain data on the journeys made by that vehicle during the survey period (normally one week). Each journey record is in turn linked to 0-m ‘goods records’ (A3 data set) which contain data on the basic transport operations which make up that journey.

Figure 1 illustrates the structure of the data.

It should be noted that there may not be multiple goods records for each journey record. For laden journeys, depending on the method used to record journeys, and/or on the type of journey, there may be only one goods record linked to each journey record. For unladen journeys, there shall normally be no linked goods records (although the existence of linked goods records for empty journeys is permitted).

The ‘Methodological appendix’ in Annex A to Regulation (EC) No 1172/98 provides further information.

2.   LIST OF FIELDS

The following information is provided for each field:

3.   MISSING VALUES

By default, missing values in data records shall be coded as an empty field (no data between two successive field separators). For certain fields, Eurostat may recommend the use of specific codes for missing values or other special values (see column ‘specific codes for missing values’).

Additional information is provided in the reference manual for the implementation of Regulation (EC) No 1172/98 on statistics on the carriage of goods by road.

4.   CHANGE IN CONFIGURATION OR TYPE OF TRANSPORT

Annex A to Regulation (EC) No 1172/98 noted that during a survey period a vehicle might be subject to a change in configuration (addition of a trailer giving rise to a change in axle configuration and load capacity) or the type of transport might vary between journeys. These changes should be recorded, although this is not obligatory.

In order to permit the transmission of these data within the normal data structures described here, the variables A1.2, A1.4, A1.5 and A1.7 shall be transmitted as part of the A2 data set (journey-related variables).

5.   VALIDATION OF DATA BY EUROSTAT

Eurostat shall apply some validation checks to the data transmitted by Member States, before the data are loaded into the production database. Where a significant number of records fails these checks, Eurostat shall notify the Member State of the records in error and provide an indication of the reasons for non-acceptance. The Member State shall be requested to rectify the errors noted and then to re-submit the complete set of three data sets for that quarter (not just the records that were in error). This procedure is necessary in order to guarantee the correctness of the weighting factors and the coherence between the vehicle, journey and goods records.

Where the number of records containing errors is very small and the likely effect on any analysis insignificant, Eurostat shall load those records that pass the verification checks and to discard the records in error. In such a case a Member State shall be informed of the records not passing the checks and the reasons. The Member State shall be invited, if it wished, to correct the errors found and to resubmit the complete set of three data sets for that quarter (not just the records that were in error). Where a re-submission is made, Eurostat shall load the revised data but if no re-submission is made, Eurostat shall use the date already accepted for the preparation of aggregated tables.

6.   NAMING OF DATA SETS

Names of data sets shall be, according to the Stadium requirements, in the form ‘CCYYQnROADAx.ZZZ’ where:

Examples:

The above specified data set name has to appear in the subject line of the electronic mail.

7.   TRANSMISSION MEDIA

The preferred transmission support is Stadium, sent to an address to be notified by Eurostat. Note that electronic mail is subject to maximum size limits which may exclude its use for large data sets.

8.   TRANSITIONAL PERIOD

In a transitional period, the data may also be sent in ASCII data sets with variable-length fields. The semi-colon (‘;’) is used as the field separator.

All fields must be present even if they are empty (that is, two successive field separators).

Additional spaces in the data fields shall be ignored, unless the specific instructions for a field prohibit the presence of additional spaces.

Furthermore during this transitional period Eurostat shall also support the reception of data by post on diskettes or recordable compact disks (CD-R). Data shall not be accepted on magnetic tapes or on paper.

Where data are to be sent by electronic mail, the following rules shall apply in a transitional period:

( 1 ) OJ L 163, 6.6.1998, p. 1.

( 2 ) OJ L 326, 18.12.1999, p. 39.

( 3 ) OJ L 181, 28.6.1989, p. 47.