How to use the Regulatory burden measure  |  Guidance notes

Form 1 – create an option

About this form

Here, you name your option and add related info, such as the total number of businesses, community members, or government sectors affected by the option.

Important! You need to create an option before you can create tasks or activity costings.

Handy hint! You can create all your options first and then go back and create tasks and activity costings.

What to include

You don't have to fill in the Supporting evidence field. All other fields must be filled in.

Option name

This is a title/short description of the option. Make it as clear and descriptive as possible, but keep it short (no more than 8 words).

The name helps you tell the difference between one option and another.

Option description

This is the long description of the option. It must cover more info than the short description.

You can cut and paste the info from another document, such as a Microsoft Word document.

You will also need to answer some questions to help complete the regulatory burden and cost offset (RBCO) table

• ‘Is this option deregulatory?’ [select either yes or no].
• If yes, ‘Is this option a regulatory offset for a new proposal?’ [select either yes or no]
• If yes: ‘Where does the offset originate from?’ [select either the agency, within portfolio, or outside portfolio].

Total number of entities affected

This is the actual number of businesses, community organisations, or individuals affected by the option. You can round the number up or down or provide exact numbers.

If you chose to calculate costs by size of business or community organisation, you'll see checkboxes for small, medium, and large units. Click the relevant checkbox(es) (for example, click the 'Small' checkbox if you're calculating costs for small businesses), then enter the total number of those businesses affected.

Level of certainty of the number of entities affected

Choose the radio button showing how certain you are that the info you’ve entered is correct: e.g., how accurate is the number of businesses or community members you think will be affected?

Supporting evidence

This is any evidence that supports the info you’ve entered into the form. This includes info you entered in the description field or the total number of entities affected by the option.

You don't have to fill in this field, but it will help you make your case.

Handy hint! You can cut and paste the info from another document, such as a Microsoft Word document.

Important! If you select ‘Yes’ to the question ‘Is this option deregulatory?’ the regulatory burden measure will automatically convert any positive numbers entered in the activity costing to negatives to generate its reports.

Important! When pasting text into the Regulatory burden measure, you will lose any formatting, such as bold or bullet points.

What next?

When you’ve filled in the form, click the Add this option button. You'll see the option appear in the list with the relevant segments.

Click the Cancel button to exit the form. This will not save anything you’ve entered.

Any problems?

Error messages

You might see an error message if you don't fill in a mandatory field.

You can't add the option until you follow the instructions in the message that appears.