Data and methodology

General notes

The summary statistics reported in this publication on number of applications received are based on the number of applications received and validated (i.e. applications received and determined valid by local authorities). Local authorities differ in their ability to report on invalid / incomplete licences, so any national figures reported on this basis are likely to provide a partial picture only.

Applications for short term lets are either for Full, Renewal, Temporary, or Exemption licences. In addition, if an application is received before 1 October 2023 from an existing host of a short term let, that application receives a provisional licence, under which the host can continue operating until they received a determination. When an application which has received a provisional licence is granted, that provisional licence is changed to a full licence. An application from a new host, or received after 1 October 2023, is recorded as a new licence and needs to be granted before the new host can operate.

Under the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 (Licensing of Short-term Lets) Order 2022, local authorities have 12 months to process an application from existing hosts and 9 months for new hosts to reach a final decision on the application (this timeline may be extended through application for an extension to the courts or where applications are suspended for up to 3 months where the authority has concluded an application should be made to planning).

Note that the licences by type figures presented reflect the status of the application as at the end of the quarterly period prior to the point of the data extraction taking place. Some of the applications recorded in the Full Licence category for a given quarter may have been previously Provisional or New Licences at an earlier time point in the same quarter, however this initial status is not always separately identifiable.

Operational context

This statistical publication reports on the operation of the short term lets licensing scheme under the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 (Licensing of Short-term Lets) Order 2022.

The scheme is administrated by local authorities, who as per the Order are required to maintain a public register of the applications and licences, and to share data on applications and licences for statistical purposes with the Scottish Government.

Local authority licensing schemes opened to receive applications from 1 October 2022. Existing hosts and operators had until 1 October 2023 to apply for a licence and can continue operating under a provisional licence whilst their applications are being determined, although if an application was not received by this date, they will not be able to operate until they make an application, and a full licence has been granted.

Data collection

The Scottish Government collects record level data from local authorities, collected quarterly through a dedicated web portal managed by Scottish Government called ProcXed. A data specification sets out the data to be provided, along with values and definitions for each data field. As specified, local authorities are only required to report validated applications for licences to the Scottish Government although some may voluntarily supply non-validated records for completeness.

Communication with data supply partners

The Scottish Government maintains a regular correspondence the local authority contact who supply the licensing data, through working group meetings as well as the use of the Improvement Service Knowledge Hub to share key documentation and provide a forum for discussion and support.

Data quality

The Scottish Government receives data from the local authorities into a web portal known as ProcXed. This performs a basic validation automatic error checking which prompts local authorities to correct any errors it detects in the supplied data.

Once this data collection concludes the data is downloaded by Scottish Government statisticians and the data is processed to ensure that it is consistent between quarters and to detect any further errors. Errors are corrected as part of a Reproducible Analytical Pipeline.

Once draft statistics are collated, as a further quality check the summarised statistics collated by Scottish Government statisticians are then sent to local authorities to confirm that they represent an accurate representation of what they have reported in the record level data.

Whilst the data quality steps as set out above should help to minimise the risk of any data issues being present, the fact that this is a relatively new data collection based on new processes being applied by local authorities means that there may be some potential for some initial teething issues being present. If any future data issues are identified, we will aim to work with the local authorities involved to receive corrected data and to apply any necessary revisions to figures in future publications.