International Passenger Survey, 2019

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.The International Passenger Survey (IPS) aims to collect data on both credits and debits for the travel account of the Balance of Payments, provide detailed visit information on overseas visitors to the United Kingdom (UK) for tourism policy, and collect data on international migration.Users should note that currently the data covers the first three quarters of 2019 with four subject areas, termed 'Airmiles', 'Alcohol', 'Qregtown' and 'Qcontact'. One file is produced each quarter per subject area, and the dataset updated quarterly. These files can be joined together using the variables YEAR, SERIAL, FLOW and QUARTER. The depositor recommends that only expert users who are very familiar with the coding and weighting structures use these data, as limited support is available. Some considerable understanding of the data is required before meaningful analyses can be made; care must be taken when performing time series operations as codes can vary from year to year and not all variables from one year's dataset are used in other years. Latest edition informationFor the fifth edition (September 2022), a revised Qcontcust 2009-2019 data file was added to the study, with additional category labels added. The data file includes all years from 2009-2019 and users will need to filter the data by year to see cases for individual years.Main Topics:Each of the four subject areas of this study covers different topics, as it follows:'Airmiles': quarter; flow; serial; UK port or route; direct leg overseas port; final overseas port; distance from UK port to first port; from first to second port; from UK port to second port'Alcohol': year; quarter; month; flow; serial; money spent on spirits; wine; beer; champagne; cigarettes; hand-rolled and other tobacco'Qreg' (covers 2009-2019): year; quarter; month; flow; serial; towns stayed in overnight; details of type of accommodation; number of nights spent in towns; expenditure in towns; regional stay weight; regional visit weight; regional expenditure weight; various validation checks'Qcontact': year; quarter; month; flow; serial; nationality; country of visit/residence; UK counties; date visit began; purpose of visit; intended length of stay; number of people; package tour and cost; expenditure pre-, post- and during visit; flight prefix and suffix; first carrier air or shipping line; direct leg overseas port; final overseas port; long- or short-haul; type of vehicle; number travelling in vehicle; fare type and cost; class of travel; business trip; type of flight; flight origin or destination; gender; age group; UK port or route; quality of response; date of interview; money transfer, net and total expenditure; type of transport; arrivals (number of adults); departures (type of travelling group, number of adults and children); weighting variables; various validation checks