Business audits: don't neglect fine points; brushing up on details will save auditing headaches

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, August, 1988 by Michael Garry

Business audits: Don't neglect fine points

New York City--Business circulators, test yourselves: Must reader request cards contain a signature in order to be counted on a magazine audit statement? No, says former auditor Barry Green, now director of circulation, Hearst Business Communications, Inc. Speaking at Face to Face, The FOLIO:Show/Spring, Green noted that even the most astute business magazine circulators may overlook some of the more arcane regulations in winding through the auditing maze.

A sample of those fine points:

* Qualified subscribers to monthlies must receive at least six months of continuous service, subject to normal additions and removals. In certain circumstances, if a recipient is rotated out of the qualified circulation roster before six months have elapsed, that recipient must be retroactively removed from the count for that period.

If, for example, 5,000 names from an association list are added to the qualified count, and 2,000 are dropped three months later, they must be eliminated from the count for the first three months. "Someone could easily break this rule without thinking anything is wrong," said Green.

* Both Business Publications Audit of Circulation (BPA) and Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) stipulate that a request card must provide for a reader's signature and a yes/no question relating to interest in receiving the magazine. Yet, no requirement states that the card must be signed or checked "yes"; the fact that the card was mailed back is proof that the person wants the free publication.

"As an auditor, I found many knowledgeable circulation professionals were unnecessarily sending back unsigned cards," said Green. On the other hand, an auditor "would look askance if 50 percent of your documents were unsigned and unchecked." Reader service cards, by contrast, must be both signed and checked to be considered valid, he noted.

Sweepstakes are weak source

* Responses to sweepstakes offers in request solicitations, must be counted as "other sources"--the lowest category on the audit statement. Details of the sweepstakes must also be outlined on the back of the publisher's statement.

* Trade show attendees must also be grouped under "other sources."

* A qualified recipient who qualifies for another publication from the same publisher, if listed, must be listed under "other sources"--not under written communication--for the second publication.

* No more than one magazine may be listed on a qualification card.

* A publication mailed to a library, even if addressed to a person, counts as "company name only."

* In listing a business directory as a circulation source, the date of the directory must include both the month and the year. If the month is omitted, it is assumed to be January. If the directory spans two years, the month is assumed to be July of the earlier year.

* If a directory or roster generates more than 10 percent of the circulation, that fact must be footnoted on the publisher's statement.

* If using a "short request form" to find out whether a recipient still wants the publication, be sure the demographic data on that recipient are current. Data more than three years old no longer qualify.

* If you have a question about your publisher's statement, don't call the audit bureau first. That just raises the bureau's suspicions that something may be awry. Instead, call another circulator or two and get opinions. "I find that most circulation people--even in competitive publications--are very easy to communicate with," said Green.