APPENDIX DATA QUALITY ISSUES
DECEMBER 2000: CHANGES TO NEW ZEALAND PASSPORT FORMAT
The format of New Zealand passport numbers changed in December 2000 causing a decline in the estimates of short-term visitor arrivals from New Zealand and a subsequent increasing discrepancy between the estimates presented in this publication and final data. As the number of new and renewed passports issued to New Zealanders increased, the number of New Zealand movements as recorded by TRIPS declined.
To resolve the problem, DIAC modified the reporting system to identify both kinds of passports and supplied the ABS with corrected New Zealand TRIPS data backdated to December 2000. The correct data supplied by DIAC was used in the TRIPS model by the ABS in March 2003, with the updated estimates of New Zealand visitors published in the February 2003 issue of Overseas Arrivals and Departures, Australia (cat. no. 3401.0).