
Article 1 
Annexes I, II, III and V to Regulation (EC) No 198/2006 are replaced by the text set out in the Annex to this Regulation.
Article 2 
This Regulation shall enter into force on the 20th day following its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.
This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.Done at Brussels, 17 September 2010.
For the Commission
The President
José Manuel BARROSO
ANNEX
1. 
 ‘ANNEX I The values “core” and “key” in the column “variable group” are explained in Annex III. The value “ID” means that the variable is an “identification variable” (no missing allowed). In the column “variable type” the value “QL” refers to “Qualitative variable” of type Yes/No, “QM” to “Qualitative variable” with multiple categories as described in the table and “QT” refers to “Quantitative variable”. CVT stands for Continuing Vocational Training. NACE refers to economic activity according to NACE Rev 2. 1. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
COUNTRY ID  Country code
REGION ID  Region identification NUTS — level 1
REFYEAR ID  Reference year
RESPID ID  Enterprise ID
RESPWEIGHT ID  Weighting factor Two decimal positions — use “.” as decimal separator
RESPEXTRA1 ID  Extra variable 1 (see Annex III)
RESPEXTRA2 ID  Extra variable 2 (see Annex III)
RESPEXTRA3 ID  Extra variable 3 (see Annex III)
SP_NACE ID  Sampling plan economic activity category
SP_SIZE ID  Sampling plan size group
SP_NSTRA ID  Sampling plan – Number of enterprises in the stratum defined by NACE_SP and SIZE_SP, i.e. the population
SP_N ID  Sampling plan — Number of sampled enterprises from the sample-frame in the stratum defined by NACE_SP and SIZE_SP
SP_SUB ID  Sub-sample indicator, shows if enterprise belongs to sub-sample
N_RESPST ID  Number of responding enterprises in the stratum defined by NACE_SP and SIZE_SP
N_EMPREG ID  Number of persons employed according to the register
INTRESP ID  Response indicator (sampling unit type)
INTMETHOD ID  Data collection mode
INTLANG ID  Language of data collection
 2. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
A1 Core QL Actual NACE CODE
A2tot Core QT Total number of persons employed on 31 December of the reference year
A2m  QT Total number of males employed on 31 December of the reference year
A2f  QT Total number of females employed on 31 December of the reference year
A3 Key QT Total number of persons employed on 31 December of the previous year
A4 Key QT Total number of hours worked in the reference year by persons employed
A5 Key QT Total labour costs (direct + indirect) of all persons employed in the reference year
A6  QL Introduction of any new or significantly new improved products or services or methods of producing or delivering products and services during the reference year.
 3. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
A7  QL Own or shared training centre
A8  QL Person or unit within the enterprise with responsibility for the organisation of CVT
A9  QL Assessment of future skill needs of the enterprise
A10  QM Reaction to future needs through
   Continuing vocational training of current staff
   Recruitment of new staff with the suitable qualifications, skills and competences
   Recruitment of new staff combined with specific training
   Internal reorganisation to better use existing skills and competences
A11a  QM Reviews of future skill and training needs of individual employees
   Yes, mainly by way of structured interviews
   Yes, but mainly by way of other methods
   No
A11b  QM The reviews of future skill and training needs of individual employees focus on:
   Occupations or groups of occupations
   Skills and competences
   Working tasks and activities
   Formal qualifications
A12  QM Skills and competences important in the next few years
   General IT skills
   IT professional skills
   Management skills
   Team working skills, customer handling skills, social skills
   Problem solving skills
   Office administration skills
   Foreign language skills
   Technical, practical or job-specific skills
   Oral or written communication skills
   Numeracy and/or literacy skills
   None of these
   Do not know
A13  QL Planning of CVT in the enterprise lead to a written training plan or programme
A14  QL Annual training budget, which includes provision for CVT
A15  QL National, sector or other agreements between the social partners, which cover the provision of CVT
A16a  QL Staff representatives/committees involved in the management process of continuing vocational training
A16b  QM Aspects covered by staff representatives/committees
   Objective setting of training
   Establishing criteria for the selection of participants or specific target groups
   Form/type of training (e.g. internal/external courses; other forms such as guided on-the-job training)
   Content of training
   Budget for training
   Selection of external training providers
   Evaluation/assessment of training outcomes
A17  QM Sources of information about CVT
   Public information centres/services and authorities
   Private training providers
   Personnel/staff representatives
   Others
   Do not use any such source of information
 4. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
B1a Core QL Provision of internal CVT courses in the reference year
B1b Core QL Provision of external CVT courses in the reference year
B2a Core QL Provision of guided on-the-job training in the reference year
  QT Number of participants in guided on-the-job training
B2b Core QL Provision of job rotation in the reference year
  QT Number of participants: job-rotation, exchanges, secondments or study visits
B2c Core QL Attendance at conferences/workshops in the reference year
  QT Number of participants in conferences/workshops
B2d Core QL Participation in learning and quality circles in the reference year
  QT Number of participants in learning or quality circles
B2e Core QL Planned training by self-directed learning/e-learning in the reference year
  QT Number of participants in self-directed learning/e-learning
B3  QL Provision of CVT courses in the year before the reference year
B4  QL Provision of other forms of CVT in the year before the reference year
B5a  QL Existence of CVT contributions in the reference year
  QT Amount of contributions CVT (in euros)
B5b  QL Existence of CVT receipts in the reference year
  QT Amount of receipts CVT (in euros)
B6  QM Measures the enterprise benefits from
   Tax incentives (tax allowances, tax exemptions, tax credits, tax relief, tax deferrals)
   Receipts from training funds (national, regional, sector)
   EU subsidies (e.g. European Social Fund)
   Government subsidies
   Other sources
   None of these

The following sections 5 and 6 shall be addressed to enterprises providing CVT courses in the reference year [(B1a or B1b) = YES].

Section 7 shall be addressed to all training enterprises in the reference year, i.e.:


— enterprises providing CVT courses in 2010 [(B1a or B1b) = YES], or
— enterprises providing other forms of CVT [(B2a or B2b or B2c or B2d or B2e) = YES].

Section 8 shall be addressed to non-training enterprises.
 5. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
C1tot Key QT Total number of CVT course participants
C2m  QT Number of CVT course participants — males
C2f  QT Number of CVT course participants — females
C3tot Key QT Paid working time (in hours) spent on all CVT courses
C3i  QT Paid working time (in hours) for internal CVT courses
C3e  QT Paid working time (in hours) for external CVT courses
C4  QT Share of training hours spent on obligatory courses for health and safety at work
C5  QL Subjects covered
   General IT skills
   IT professional skills
   Management skills
   Team working skills, customer handling skills, social skills
   Problem solving skills
   Office administration skills
   Foreign language skills
   Technical, practical or job-specific skills
   Oral or written communication skills
   Numeracy and/or literacy skills
   None of these
C5Main  QL Main subject (with respect to volume of training hours)
C6  QL Providers (external courses)
   Schools, colleges, universities and other higher education institutions
   Public training institutions (financed or guided by the government; e.g. adult education centre)
   Private training companies
   Private companies whose main activity is not training
   Employer’s associations, chambers of commerce, sector bodies
   Trade unions
   Other training providers
C6Main  QL Main provider (with respect to volume of training hours)
 6. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
C7a  QL Existence of fees
  QT CVT course costs — fees and payments for courses for employees (in euros)
C7b  QL Existence of travel costs
  QT CVT course costs — travel and subsistence payments (in euros)
C7c  QL Existence of labour costs of internal trainers
  QT CVT course costs — labour costs of internal trainers (in euros)
C7d  QL Existence of costs of training centre and teaching materials etc.
  QT CVT course costs — training centre, or rooms and teaching materials for CVT courses (in euros)
C7sub  QL Existence of “Sub-total only” (no sub-categories)
 Key QT CVT costs sub-total (in euros)
PAC Key QT Personal absence cost — to be calculated (PAC=C3tot*A5/A4 in euros)
C7tot Key QT Total cost CVT — to be calculated (C7sub + B5a – B5b (in euros)
 7. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
D1  QM Aspects considered to ensure the quality of CVT
   Certification of external providers (e.g. use of national registers)
   Continuous training of internal trainers
   Continuing vocational training and certification is based on national/sector recognised standards or frameworks
   Others
   No particular aspect considered
D2a  QM Assessment of the outcomes of CVT activities
   Yes, for all activities
   Yes, for some activities
   No, proof of participation is sufficient
D2b  QM Methods of assessment
   Certification after written or practical test
   Satisfaction survey amongst participants
   Assessment of participants’ behaviour or performance in relation to training objectives
   Assessment/measurement of the impact of training on performance of relevant departments or the whole enterprise
   Other
D3  QM Factors limiting CVT provision in the reference year
   No limiting factor: level of training provided was appropriate to the enterprises needs
   Recruitment of individuals with the required qualifications, skills and competencies
   Difficulties in assessing training needs in the enterprise
   Lack of suitable offerings of CVT courses in the market
   High costs of CVT courses
   Higher focus on IVT provision than on CVT
   Major efforts in CVT realised in recent years
   Limited time available for staff to participate in CVT
   Other reasons
 8. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
E1  QM Reasons for not providing CVT in the reference year
   The existing qualifications, skills and competences were appropriate to the current needs of the enterprise
   Recruitment of individuals with the required qualifications, skills and competencies was preferred
   Difficulties in assessing training needs in the enterprise
   Lack of suitable offerings of CVT courses in the market
   High costs of CVT courses
   Higher focus on IVT provision than on CVT
   Major efforts in CVT realised in recent years
   No time available for staff to participate in CVT
   Other reasons
 9. 

Variable name Variable group Variable type Variable description
F1tot Core QT Total number of IVT participants in the enterprise during the reference year
F2  QM Reasons for providing IVT (if F1Tot > 0)
   To qualify future employees according to the needs of the enterprise
   To choose the best apprentices for future employment after completion of initial vocational training
   To avoid possible mismatch with enterprise needs in case of external recruitment
   To make use of the productive capacities of IVT participants already during their initial vocational training
   Other (e.g. to make the enterprise more attractive to potential staff)

Member States can transmit complementary variables to the Commission (Eurostat) on an optional basis in a harmonised format as described in the “European Union Manual” referred to in Article 8.’;


2. 
 ‘ANNEX II  1. Business registers referred to in Regulation (EC) No 177/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 February 2008 establishing a common framework for business registers for statistical purposes shall be taken as the main source of the sampling frame. A nationally representative stratified probability sample of enterprises shall be taken from this frame.
 2. 

— 20 NACE Rev.2 categories [B, C10-C12, C13-C15, C17-C18, C19-C23, C24-C25, C26-C28 and C33, C29-C30, C16+C31-32, D-E, F, G(45), G(46), G(47), I, H, J, K(64,65), K(66), L+M+N+R+S],
— Member States can cover other sectors and use additional categories for the stratification (e.g. O, P, and Q) on an optional basis,
— 3 enterprise size categories, according to their number of persons employed: (10-49) (50-249) (250 and more) for countries with fewer than 50 million inhabitants,
— 6 enterprise size categories, according to their number of persons employed: (10-19) (20-49) (50-249) (250-499) (500-999) (1 000 and more) for Member States with 50 million inhabitants and more.
 3. A sample size shall be calculated to assure a maximum half-length of the 95 % confidence interval of 0,2 for the estimated parameters, which are a proportion of “training enterprises” (after allowance for the non-response rate in the sample) for each of the 60 stratified elements identified above (120 stratified elements for Member States with 50 million inhabitants and more).
 4. 
nh = 1/[c2 × teh + 1/Nh] / rh

Where:

rhthe anticipated response rate in the stratum cell, hcmaximum length of half the confidence intervaltehthe anticipated proportion of training enterprises in the stratum cell, hNhthe total number of enterprises (training and non-training) in the stratum cell, h


3. 
 ‘ANNEX III 
Countries shall take all appropriate measures to reduce item and unit non-response. Prior to imputation countries shall make all reasonable efforts to use other data sources.

Core variables, for which no missing value shall be accepted, nor imputation permitted are:


— A1, A2tot, B1a, B1b, B2a(QL), B2b(QL) B2c(QL), B2d(QL) B2e(QL), F1tot.

Key variables, for which every effort should be made to avoid missing values and for which imputation is recommended are:


— A3, A4, A5, C1tot, C3tot, C7sub, C7tot, PAC.

Imputation for item non-response shall be recommended within the following general limits:


1.. When a record contains less than 50 % of variables presented then this record shall normally be considered as a unit non-response.
2.. For a single NACE Rev.2/size cell imputations shall not be allowed if more than 50 % of the responding enterprises have missing data for more than 25 % of the quantitative variables.
3.. For a single NACE Rev.2/size cell, no imputation shall be performed on a quantitative variable if the proportion of responding enterprises for that particular variable is less than 50 %.
4.. For a single NACE Rev.2/size cell, no imputation shall be performed on a qualitative variable if the proportion of responding enterprises for that particular variable is less than 80 %.

Quantitative and qualitative variables are identified in Annex I.

Member States shall calculate and transmit a weight to be applied to each data record together with any auxiliary variables, which may have been used in the calculation of this weight. These auxiliary variables should be recorded as the variables RESPEXTRA1, RESPEXTRA2, RESPEXTRA3 as necessary. The methodology adopted for establishing the weights shall be detailed in the quality report.’;


4. 
 ‘ANNEX V 
Member States shall submit quality reports to be written according to a standard quality-reporting format provided by the Commission (Eurostat). A copy of the national questionnaire shall accompany the quality report.
 1. 
Implementation of the survey and the degree to which statistics meet current and potential users’ needs. This covers a description of users and their individual needs as well as an evaluation of to what degree these needs have been satisfied.
 2.  2.1. 
This covers:


— Description of the sample design and the realised sample.
— Description of the calculation of the final weights including non-response model and auxiliary variables used, estimator used, e.g. Horvitz-Thompson estimator, variance of the estimates according to the sample strata, variance estimation software, in particular, a description of the auxiliary variables or information used should be reported in order to recalculate the final weights within Eurostat since it is needed for variance estimation.
— In case of non-response analysis, a description of the biases in the sample and results.

Tables to be provided (broken down by NACE Rev.2 and size classes according to the national sampling plan):


— Number of enterprises in the sampling frame.
— Number of enterprises in the sample.

Tables to be provided (broken down by NACE Rev.2 and size classes according to the national sampling plan, however allocation according to the observed enterprise characteristics):


— Coefficients of variation for the following key statistics.
— Total number of persons employed, total number of enterprises that provided CVT, ratio of the total number of enterprises that provided CVT to the total number of enterprises.
— Total number of enterprises that provided CVT courses, ratio of the total number of enterprises that provided CVT courses to the total number of enterprises.
— Total number of persons employed in enterprises that provided CVT, total number of participants in CVT courses, ratio of the total number of participants in CVT courses to the total number of persons employed, ratio of the total number of participants in CVT courses to the total number of persons employed in enterprises that provided CVT.
— Total costs of CVT courses.
— Total number of enterprises providing IVT, total number of participants in IVT, ratio of the total number of enterprises providing IVT to the total number of enterprises.
 2.2.  2.2.1. 
This covers:


— Description of the register used for sampling and its overall quality, information included in the register, and its updating frequency.
— Errors due to the discrepancies between the sampling frame and the target population and sub-populations (over-coverage, under-coverage, misclassifications).
— Methods used to obtain this information and notes on the processing of misclassifications.

Tables to be provided (broken down by NACE Rev.2 and size classes according to the national sampling plan, however allocation according to the observed enterprise characteristics):


— Number of enterprises.
— Ratio of the number of enterprises for which the observed strata equals the sampling strata.
 2.2.2. 
Where appropriate an assessment of errors that occurred at the stage of data collection due for example to:


— The questionnaire design (results of pre-tests or laboratory methods; questioning strategies).
— Reporting unit/respondent considering the data collection mode used (e.g. problems and strategies to find the appropriate respondent(s) in the enterprise, memory problems, errors when filling the forms, assistance to the respondent). This includes a description and assessment of measures taken to assure the high quality of the information related to “participants” and to assure that “participant events” were not collected.
— Existence/use of relevant information systems and administrative records in the enterprise, e.g. correspondence between the administrative and survey concept (reference period, availability of individual data).
— Methods used to reduce this kind of errors, problems with the questionnaire as a whole or with single questions.
 2.2.3. 
This covers a description of the data editing process such as processing system and tools used, errors due to coding, editing, weighting or tabulation, quality checks at macro/micro level and corrections/failed edits.
 2.2.4. 
This covers an assessment of unit non-response and item non-response and a description of the measures undertaken regarding “re-contacts” as well as:


— Full report on imputation procedures including methods used for imputation and/or re-weighting.
— Methodological notes and results of non-response analysis or other methods to assess the effects of non-response.

Tables to be provided (broken down by NACE Rev.2 and size classes according to the national sampling plan, however allocation according to the observed enterprise characteristics):


— Unit response rates.
— Item response rates for the following with respect to all respondents: total number of hours work as a function of all respondents and total labour cost as a function of all respondents.
— Item response rates for the following with respect to enterprises offering CVT courses:
— Total number of participants in courses, males, females as a function of enterprises offering CVT courses.
— Total number of hours on CVT courses as a function of enterprises offering CVT courses, number of hours on CVT courses managed internally and externally as a function of enterprises offering CVT courses.
— Total costs of CVT courses as a function of enterprises offering CVT courses.
— Item response rates for the following with respect to enterprises offering IVT: Total number of participants in IVT as a function of enterprises offering IVT.
 3. 
This covers a table of dates when each of the following phases of the project started and ended such as fieldwork (considering the different data collection modes), reminders and follow-up, data checking and editing, further validation and imputation, non-response survey (as appropriate) and estimations as well as data transmission to Eurostat and dissemination of national results.
 4. 
This covers the type of results sent to enterprises, a dissemination scheme of results and a copy of any methodological documents relating to the statistics provided.
 5. 
This covers the deviations from the standard European questionnaire and definitions provided in the manual referred to in Article 8 and a description of links done with other statistical sources (use of certain data available in registers, survey linked to another national survey).
 6. 
This covers a comparison of statistics for the same phenomenon or item from other surveys or sources and an assessment of coherence with structural business statistics for the number of persons employed as a function of NACE Rev.2 and Size Group.

Tables to provide (broken down by NACE Rev.2 and size classes according to the national sampling plan, however allocation according to the observed enterprise characteristics):


— Number of persons employed from structural business statistics and number of persons employed from CVTS.
— Percentage of differences (SBS — CVTS)/SBS.
 7. 
This covers an analysis of the burden and benefit at national level through, for example, a consideration of average time for answering to each questionnaire, problematic questions and variables, variables most/least useful in describing CVT at national level, estimated or actual satisfaction level of data users at national level, difference of burden between for small and large enterprises and efforts made to reduce burden.

