THE ERIC RECKONING · Article 4 of 8
The Data Quality Problem NHS England Admits but the Market Ignores
NHS Estate Directors · Capital Planners · FM Suppliers · Procurement Leads · Framework Bodies
NHS England’s own ERIC data quality statements contain formal admissions of errors,
unreliable fields, and experimental designations that would significantly change how the market uses this data if anyone read them. With the Critical Infrastructure Risk field now directly controlling capital allocation under the 85/15 formula, those admissions are no longer a methodological footnote. They are a capital governance issue.
The documents that nobody reads
Every ERIC publication is accompanied by a data quality statement. NHS England publishes these alongside the main reports. They document known issues with specific data fields, post publication corrections, definition changes that affect comparability, and formal quality designations for fields where the data does not yet meet the full standards of National Statistics.
These documents are public, detailed, and consequential. They are also almost entirely absent from the commentary that ERIC data generates. The annual cycle of headlines, Parliamentary questions, NHS Confederation statements, and investment arguments proceeds as if the data quality documentation does not exist.
What follows is what those documents actually say, applied to the specific fields that matter most for capital decisions, FM contract pricing, and NHS procurement strategy.
The Critical Infrastructure Risk errors that drove capital allocation
In 2024, NHS England conducted an extensive review of ERIC data following identification of errors in previously published returns. The review found that many trusts had reported errors in the Investment to Reduce Backlog Maintenance fields, specifically Critical Infrastructure Risk and non Critical Infrastructure Risk.
These are the fields that matter most under the new capital regime. Critical Infrastructure Risk is the 15% component of the 85/15 formula that now determines part of every trust’s operational capital allocation. The fields that directly influence NHS capital funding were found to contain material errors across many trusts, across multiple years.
Amendments were issued. Revised figures were published. Users were urged to download corrected versions. The market commentary on the 2022/23 ERIC data, the capital investment arguments made on the basis of it, the procurement strategies shaped by it, had already been written and acted upon before the corrections were available. The decisions were made on the original figures. The corrections came after.
This is not an accusation of bad faith by NHS England. The review, the corrections, and the transparency about what was found are exactly what good data governance looks like. The problem is that the market does not read the corrections. The headline figure was reported, cited, and built into strategies. The amended figure was published quietly in a revised spreadsheet that most users never downloaded.
The decisions were made on the original figures. The corrections came after. With 15% of every trust’s capital allocation now tied to the CIR field, the cost of not reading the corrections has gone from reputational to financial.
The October 2024 amendment and what it corrected
On 30 October 2024, NHS England identified that the figure for Soft FM (Hotel Services) in the National Level Data table in the provisional 2023/24 ERIC Report had been incorrectly published. The figure published was £4,175,298,709. The correct figure was £4,175,077,931, a difference of approximately £220,000. No other tables were affected and site level data remained correct. The correction was incorporated into version 2 of the report.
This specific error is small in the context of the overall ERIC dataset. It is worth noting because it demonstrates the pattern: errors are identified, corrections are issued, and most users are working from the original version without awareness that the figures changed. For any organisation using ERIC data in a published document, a pricing model, or a board paper, the first question before using any figure is: is this from the current published version?
Fields labelled unreliable and the experimental statistics designation
Across multiple years of ERIC publication, NHS England has labelled specific data fields as unreliable due to having changed definition since the previous reporting period. An unreliable designation means the field should not be compared against prior year figures because the definition changed in a way that makes the numbers non comparable.
NHS England has also begun formally designating some ERIC backlog data fields as experimental statistics. Under the UK Statistics Authority's Code of Practice for Official Statistics, experimental status means the methodology is still being developed and the data does not yet meet full National Statistics standards. The Office for Statistics Regulation monitors this designation. When the OSR
or NHS England labels data experimental, they are formally signalling that the methodology is in development. Yet capital programmes running to 2030 are being justified using this data as a baseline.
The question is specific and it matters: which ERIC fields currently carry the experimental designation, and are those fields contributing to capital allocation decisions as if they were established National Statistics? If the Critical Infrastructure Risk field, the 15% component of the allocation formula, carries caveats of this kind, the appropriate response is not to stop investing in the NHS estate. It is to invest while improving the data quality of the measure directing that investment.
Data quality designations in ERIC and what they mean
Unreliable: Definition has changed since the previous reporting period. Do not use for year on year trend comparison.
Experimental: Does not yet meet full National Statistics standards. OSR monitors. Methodology under active development. Treat with caution. Do not use as sole basis for major decisions.
Provisional: Released before full validation is complete. Final figures may differ. Not for year on year comparison.
Amended: Post publication correction issued. Earlier versions contain errors. Download the latest version before using any figure in analysis.
What to do with this information
For NHS estate directors making capital cases: present your ERIC figures alongside the survey evidence they are based on, the date of the last independent survey, and a clear statement of the methodology used to classify condition. A board that understands the basis of the ERIC figure is a board that can make a better informed decision about the investment it is authorising.
For FM suppliers and contractors: before pricing a significant NHS contract using ERIC condition data, download the current published version of the relevant year’s data and check whether any fields relevant to your pricing have been amended since first publication. Check the data quality statement for unreliable or experimental designations. Treat the condition data as a starting point requiring independent validation before it becomes a pricing input.
For procurement teams and framework bodies: the ERIC fields most relevant to your framework design, the contracted out percentages, the backlog by risk category, the running cost benchmarks, are among the fields most frequently subject to definition change and unreliable designations. Build your framework logic on the pattern and direction of the data, not on precise year by year figures that the methodology does not support comparing directly.
The risk
Capital plans, FM pricing models, and procurement strategies built on ERIC data may rest on figures that have been subsequently corrected, relabelled as unreliable, or acknowledged as experimental. Most users are working from the original published version and are unaware the figures changed. With CIR now tied to capital allocation, this is no longer just a data quality issue.
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Next in the series · Article 5 of 8
The Primary Care Black Hole: The Half of the NHS Estate ERIC Cannot See
This article represents Baachu’s independent analysis based on publicly available information, including NHS England ERIC publications and data quality statements. Baachu Works Limited has no commercial relationship with NHS England, NHS Property Services, or any FM provider, NHS trust, or estate services firm referenced in this series. This article is not legal or financial advice.