C10051 Check documentation guide

Student record 2010/11

Introduction

• Item priorities
• What to do if you find issues within your check documentation

Introduction to check documentation 

A successful TEST_COMMIT/COMMIT transaction will generate several reports containing management information that institutions will need to review to assess data quality. The check documentation is the most substantial of these reports.

Check documentation takes the form of an Excel workbook containing a series of tables which present much of the returned data to enable institutions to ensure that their submission represents their institution as expected. In part check documentation provides a preview of some of the onward uses of the data. Therefore review of the check documentation should be undertaken by institutions to verify the submitted data. Within the check documentation is an 'Institutional_information' tab. The items held within this tab are provided for institutional purposes and highlight useful internal planning/data management areas. Alongside this, the Campus, PI, UCAS data for HESA and RAE 2008 tabs are designed solely for institutional checking. These sections of the check documentation are not analysed by HESA.

All other tabs within the Excel workbook are intended to be checked by both institutions and HESA. Colleagues within institutions are in an excellent position to recognise more detailed anomalies within their data, using local knowledge of the intricacies of their own institutions, and are strongly encouraged to closely scrutinise the check documentation reports. The check documentation is also used by HESA to conduct data analysis and quality assurance of a data submission. Queries raised on these items form the basis of any data quality queries fed back to institutions through the Minerva data quality database.

This guide details each of the items in turn, providing details of the populations and fields used in their creation along with guidance on interpreting the item and tips detailing common issues. Note that this guide is not exhaustive and institutions are advised to extensively review the check documentation for their own purposes.

Data Supply: The derived fields (identifiable as those that begin with 'X') used for each check documentation item are listed within this help guide. The derived field specifications and populations can be downloaded from the 'Data Supply' icon that is available following a successful TEST_COMMIT/COMMIT.

Item priorities:

Each check documentation item covered in this guide has been allocated a priority based on the data concerned (including minimum data quality standards acceptable to HESA's Statutory Customers), the knock-on effects, and common issues. However, the assigned priorities should be treated with caution as these are general estimates. Depending on the inserted data the actual severities assigned to data quality queries raised in Minerva may differ for individual institutions. For example, Item 4 is classified as Minor, however, if the difference between ERASMUS numbers reported by the institution and the ERASMUS UK office are significant this would inevitably increase the severity of the query raised.   

Priority	Minerva icon
Critical
Major - high priority
Major - low priority
Minor	n/a

What to do if you find issues within your check documentation:

Where anomalies are found you should record them on any relevant Minerva queries raised by HESA and set the queries to be fixed on resubmission. The institution should then contact liaison@hesa.ac.uk to request that the data is decommitted in order that the necessary amendments can be made and the data resubmitted.