In 1968 the survey was extended to include a sample drawn from the Northern Ireland FES and in April 1994 the survey changed from a calendar year to a financial year basis. The annual survey has been in existence since 1957 (with an earlier large scale survey in 1953/54) and was one of the first Department of Employment (DE) systems to be computerised in the early 1960s. With the amalgamation of the CSO and the OPCS in April 1996, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) became the responsible body, both as principal investigator and data collector. In 1989 the Central Statistical Office (CSO) took over the responsibility for the survey, with the OPCS remaining responsible for the data collection. Prior to 1989 the Department of Employment had responsibility for the survey, with the data collection being carried out by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys (OPCS). The survey is a cost efficient way of collecting a variety of related data that the government departments require to correlate with income and expenditure at the household, tax unit and person levels. The original purpose of the survey was to provide information on spending patterns for the United Kingdom Retail Price Index (RPI). However the data for 1964-1967, although held for archival purposes, is unusable due to lack of coding information. The Archive holds data from 1961 onwards. The lowest geographical identifier in the data is at the level of government office region. Data from the children's diaries has been included in the survey results for the first time in 1998-99. Children aged between 7 and 15 have also now been asked to complete simplified diaries of their daily expenditure. Each household member aged 15 or over (or 16 or over from 1973 onwards) is asked to record all expenditure made during the 14 days. Diary Records: The diary covers fourteen days. Information collected includes:- employment status and recent absences from work, earnings of an employee, self-employed earnings, National Insurance contributions, pensions and other regular allowances, occasional benefits - social security benefits and other types, investment income, miscellaneous earnings of a 'once-only' character, tax paid directly to Inland Revenue or refunded, income of a child. Income of a child not classed as a spender is obtained from one or other of his parents and entered on the parent's questionnaire. The schedule is concerned with income, national insurance contributions and income tax. Income Schedule: Data are collected for each household spender. (ii) Individual: Motor vehicles, season tickets for transport, life and accident insurances, payments through a bank, instalments, refund of expenses by employer, expenditure claimed by self-employed persons as business expenses for tax purposes, welfare foods, education grants and fees. The main part of the questionnaire relates to expenditure both of a household and individual nature, but the questions are mainly confined to expenses of a recurring nature, e.g.:( i) Household: Housing costs, payment to Gas and Electricity Boards or companies, telephone charges, licences and television rental. Information was collected about the household, the sex and age of each member, and also details about the type and size of the household accommodation. Until the introduction of the community charge, information on rateable value and rate poundage was obtained from the appropriate local authority, as was information on whether the address was within a smokeless zone. Information for most of the questions is obtained from the head of household or housewife, but certain questions of a more individual character are put to every spender aged 15 or over (or 16 or over from 1973 onwards). Household Schedule: This schedule is taken at the main interview. The UK Family Expenditure Survey (FES) (held under UK Data Archive generic study number 33057) is a continuous survey with an annual sample of around 10,000 households (about 1 in 2000 of all United Kingdom households) about 60 per cent of which co-operate by providing the interviewers with information about the household, household and personal incomes, certain payments that recur regularly (eg rent, gas and electricity bills, telephone accounts, insurances, season tickets and hire purchase payments) and in maintaining a detailed expenditure record for 14 consecutive days.
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