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ABC announces sweeping changes

This morning, the Illinois-based board of the Audit Bureau of Circulations - saying it was "responding to current market conditions" - announced several revisions to existing rules.

For starters, ABC is cutting audit costs nearly in half for some Canadian and newspapers and freezing costs for most other newspapers and magazines. In March, it had said that US newspapers with paid circulation below 50,000 would have the option to be audited every other year beginning in April 2009, raising the eligibility ceiling from its current 25,000 level. Now, ABC plans to advance this timeline by six months, to Oct. 1, 2008, and to extend the option to Canadian newspapers.

ABC also approved a new flat-rate billing model for field audit services for fiscal 2009, effectively freezing costs for most other ABC newspapers and magazines. In addition, ABC will unveil several new online filing tools in September that allow publishers to further lower their costs by digitally submitting advance audit documentation and worksheets.

"ABC has typically billed publishers based on an hourly rate," said Michael J. Lavery, ABC's president/MD. "Our new structure uses a flat rate based on the most recent ABC audit. By streamlining some aspects of the audit and automating more processes, most publications will be able to accurately forecast and control their costs."

Lavery added that large metropolitan newspapers would continue to be billed on the hourly model due to the complexity of their audits. Those rates, however, will remain frozen at their 2007 level.

ABC also gave its initial approval to rules allowing all Canadian and American newspapers with paid circulation between 50,000-75,000 to have this same biannual audit option next year, beginning April 1. "To take advantage of this," stated ABC, "a newspaper's most recent audit cannot contain an adjustment of more than 2% and its third-party circulation (e.g., copies purchased by a business in bulk quantity and distributed to customers) cannot exceed 5% of its total paid circulation."

Newspapers with circulation between 50,000-75,000 will be required to participate in ABC's Preprint Projection Center, a free online tool that allows publishers to provide confidential circulation forecasts to help advertisers better plan media purchases and insert-printing requirements. All newspapers are still required to file six-month publisher's statements, with top-line numbers reported in ABC's FAS-FAX report.

ABC stated that its Canadian members continue to review the US newspaper rule modifications for applicability here, and that it has given initial approval to several rule changes, based on the recommendations of Canadian advisory committees.

Specifically: In addition to the option of biannual audits for newspapers below 75,000 paid circulation, Canadian newspapers may immediately upgrade current home subscribers to a greater frequency, if the subscriber has the option to decline. Canadian and US newspapers may also immediately establish separate basic prices for their replica electronic editions. A new section of ABC's bylaws and rules, Article 20, was created to house the Canadian rules, and Article 10 was dissolved.

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