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Sources

Every record in openLocal came from a file an authority sent, or that we requested from it. This page shows, for one authority, what we have collected and when, so you can tell whether we hold something more recent than a file you have.

Reach an authority's history from the authority's name above any property or ratepayer page, from Sources on the dashboard, by typing its name in the search bar, or from All sources. On the history, the authority's name is itself a picker: type another to move to its history.

All sources

Every authority we hold files for, one row each, with the latest quarter we collected and the day we collected it. Filter by name, and sort by latest collection (the default) or by name. Open a row for that authority's history.

An authority's history

One row per quarter, newest first, from the first quarter we hold to the latest. A quarter in which nothing arrived keeps its row and says so, so the history never hides a gap.

• The square at the head of a row says we collected files for that quarter; a dashed square, that we collected none. The dot beneath it says those files carried reliefs.
• Latest date in sources is the newest business date inside the quarter's files: our best estimate of when the authority produced them.
• Last collected is the day we collected them. Restated, with its day, means the authority re-released a file and we updated it in place.
• Matched is how many properties on the rating list the quarter's records matched, out of the authority's list.
• Names, Reliefs, Occupation, Start dates say whether the quarter's records carried each field: filled where they did, outlined where they did not, and a dash where we did not measure that quarter.

Quarters before 2024 came from our earlier import, which never carried reliefs. Their reliefs cell is outlined because of how they were collected, not because anything is missing.

A quarter's files

Open a quarter to see its files, grouped by the day we collected them, with the rows each file held, how many matched, and how many relief charges it carried.

Some authorities are several former councils, and the same release often reaches us once through each of them, days or weeks apart. Those copies are listed beside the first collection rather than counted again, and every figure is the first collection's.

Data source page links to where the files came from. Some are freedom-of-information replies rather than public pages, and councils move their pages, so a link may no longer lead anywhere.