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Aggregate offshore record 2015/16

Back to C15052

Aggregate offshore record 2015/16

File structure


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Version 1.0 Produced 2015-04-30

The physical file structure to be returned to HESA is identical to the data model, shown in the diagram below.

HESA Aggregate offshore record entity relationship diagram

Click on the relevant section of the model to view the fields associated with each entity.

Aggregate Offshore Data Model Provision Provider

Key :

One to many icon

One-to-many relationship

Optional icon

Mandatory participation of the entity in this relationship


Note: A HEP making a nil-return will have no provision.

Data format

Data must be returned to HESA as an XML file. XML is the eXtensible Markup Language and is a W3C recommendation. There are many XML training resources on the web, including the W3C Tutorial on XML and the resources of W3Schools.

Files must be encoded with UTF-8 and schema validation will be in place to ensure this. HEPs must specify the encoding used in their XML files in the first line of the file (i.e. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>) and to ensure that their files are actually saved with that encoding. If XML files are edited with some text editors and the encoding is not specified or does not match the actual file encoding, there may be problems when submitting these files for validation.

Ordering of attributes for submission

The order in which entities and fields should be submitted is governed by the Cyy052.xsd file, which is ordered according to the following principles:

  • Entities are presented in parent-child order, starting with the 'Provider' entity.
  • Fields within entities are presented in the order of primary key fields, candidate key fields, foreign key fields, and non-key fields.
  • Child entities then follow.
  • Each field or entity within a parent entity is presented in alphabetical order to aid their location.

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