Survey of Regulatory Compliance Cost

Summary of changes

Activity on this program started: 2005

Reference period of change - 2016

For 2016, both questionnaires remain in electronic format, and both were retested. In the main questionnaire, the respondent is now asked to declare total time spent working on various regulatory compliance measures instead of average time spent "per document." All other changes corresponded to improvements made to how questions were worded. Most of the modifications were made to improve the service provider questionnaire. Additional improvements included expanding the scope to NAICS groups 5411 and 5413, adding a distribution of business clients by size, and including the average hourly rate per service offered.

Reference period of change - 2011

Instrument design - The survey underwent a significant redevelopment to prepare it for an electronic questionnaire application. The electronic questionnaire applications were extensively pre-tested with respondents to ensure functionality and to improve on wording and definitional concepts. The pre-test was conducted in October 2011. The electronic questionnaire applications were revised following the pre-test, and the resulting applications were used for the national survey in early 2012.

Collection instrument - Main component

Notable changes were made in the type and wording of the questions between 2008 and 2011 for the main component. The changes included:

1- The first two questions on size and revenue were worded quite differently in 2011.

2- Definitions were added to the questions for each regulation and the wording of the submissions questions was different in a number of cases.

3- The two regulations (municipal operating licences and permits and provincial operating licences and permits) in 2008 were combined into one regulation (municipal and provincial operating licenses and permits) in 2011.

4- One more regulation (Other government regulations) was added in 2011 questionnaire.

5- Capital costs associated with compliance were collected in 2011 for the first time.

Service provider component

Changes to the service provider component included:

1. In 2008, the questionnaire collected average time in terms of both hours and days per year. In 2011, the questionnaire only collected average time in terms of hours. This was done to help to improve the data quality.

2. Similar to the main component, the two regulations (municipal operating licences and permits and provincial operating licences and permits) in 2008 were combined into one regulation (municipal and provincial operating licenses and permits) in 2011 for the service provider component.

Reference period of change - 2008

Target population - NAICS 2007 is now used.