The Retail Sales Index

The monthly inquiry into retail sales is a sample survey carried out by the Office for National Statistics on 5,000 businesses in Great Britain, including large retailers and a representative panel of smaller businesses.

From this survey, the Retail Sales Index (RSI) is compiled each month. This is a key indicator in the progress of the economy, and is indirectly used to calculate quarterly consumer spending on retail goods and the output of the retail sector which feed into the compilation of the National Accounts.

For each four-or-five-week period, contributors report their retail sales for all their outlets and by mail order. The statistics include VAT. Instalment credit sales are valued at the credit price of the goods, that is including deposits and, where credit is provided by the shop, credit charges.

Figures of credit sales relate only to the period during which the transactions took place; cash received from credit sales in previous periods are not included. Sales by chemists and opticians exclude receipts under the National Health Service.

The retail sales index is based on the results of the 2000 annual business inquiry. The reference year has been set at 2000 = 100. It is aligned to the final results of the 2000 annual business inquiry and uses them in the estimation of sales for later years.

The RSI uses COICOP (Classification of Individual Consumption by Purpose) classification for deflators. These deflators are used to convert the value estimates on to a constant price or volume basis: most components of the retail sales index are deflated onto a volume basis using price data from the retail prices index.