BARB Controversy Continues

The controversy surrounding BARB’s new TV ratings system has deepened following speculation that the new audience research panel may not be up to its full strength of 5,200 viewers until May or June.

BARB has issued a statement saying that panel, which should have gone live before the start of the new BARB contract on 1 January, will be fully operational in the “second quarter” of this year. However, media planners and buyers do not expect the panel to be fully up and running until May or June.

Andrew Canter, broadcast director at Media Planning, said: “By saying that the new panel won’t be operational until the second quarter BARB is giving itself room to manoeuvre. Those who are going to be optimistic will expect the panel to be up to full strength by April, but I think May or June would be a more realistic expectation.”

He added: “BARB wants to get the new contract absolutely right and if more delays mean accurate data then it’s something the industry will have to accept.”

This is the third time that BARB, which has come in for criticism recently (see New BARB System Comes In For Criticism), has delayed the deadline for the new panel. In November BARB announced that the full panel would not be ready until February (see BARB Presents New Research System) and when it started operating in January, with only 4,000 viewers, BARB revised its estimate saying that it would not be up and running until March.

Separately, the National Readership Survey (NRS) has also been forced to delay the launch of its new system (see Ipsos-RSL Revealed As Winner Of New NRS Contract). NRS managing director, Roger Pratt, said that the results of pilot tests into the new DS-CAPI methodology (see MRG One Day Conference: The New NRS Contract) had been “unexpected” and confirmed that the release of data generated by the new system would be delayed until October whilst further tests are carried out.

BARB: 020 7529 5531 www.barb.co.uk NRS: 020 7632 2915 www.nrs.co.uk

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