Audit Review Committee Presents Findings To ABC Council

Recommendations for an overhaul of the Audit Bureau of Circulations’ auditing and inspection process were presented to the ABC Council yesterday. The recommendations have been drafted by the Audit Review Committee established in January in the wake of circulation irregularities discovered at the Birmingham Post and Mail.

The ABC Council has approved the recommendations in principle and are now seeking consultation on their implementation within the relevant trade bodies for the publications that will be affected. The Periodical Publishers’ Association has already arranged a date for a consultation meeting with its members and the Newspaper Society will be doing the same.

During the past eight months, the Committee has investigated every aspect of the ABC auditing and inspection process across every sector of the Consumer print media. Issues on the table include increasing the frequency of inspections, training requirements for third party auditors and the proposed creation of a new membership category for third party auditors.

“The recommendations are intended to safeguard ABC’s position as the currency for buying and selling space across print media by ensuring that we remain impartial and publish accurate data,” says ABC Chairman John Mayhead. “We want to make sure that our audit, training and inspection standards are of the highest quality and take into account the increasingly complex nature of the media business.”

Audit Bureau of Circulations: 01442 870800