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Filing a return

How an operator files a monthly activity return, what it is checked against, and how to fix and refile one that comes back. The regulator sees the same record at every step.

Before you start

Two things are public and worth reading first.

The template. One row per facility and month, with these columns in order: facility code, period (the month, as YYYY-MM), producing days, oil (bbl), gas produced, flared, fuel, exported and reinjected (Mscf), produced water (bbl, optional), cargoes lifted (optional) and notes. Download it from Returns or the API.

The rules. Every return is checked against one published catalogue — listed on Data foundation and in the Returns page's Rules tab. An error returns the file to you; a warning goes to the reviewer with it.

Filing

By file or by form. Either way the return goes through the same validation, the same rules and the same review.

  1. 1

    Choose the facility and the file — or fill the form

    The facility list shows only facilities in your scope. The form takes one month; a file can carry several.
  2. 2

    Pre-check

    Run the file — or the form, with Check against the rules — through the full catalogue. Nothing is stored. The form marks each field the rules object to, beside the field.
  3. 3

    File

    The file is stored with its SHA-256 and validated again as a job. The submission page shows where it has got to: validated, reviewed, promoted, recomputed, screened, alerted.
  4. 4

    Wait for the decision

    A clean return waits for a reviewer, who accepts it into the inventory or returns it for revision with a written note. You are notified either way.

Fixing findings

Findings are listed by month and field — the way the source spreadsheet is organised — or by rule. Download them as CSV for whoever keeps the spreadsheet.

  1. 1

    Read the errors first

    An error is blocking: producing days beyond the calendar month, a negative volume, a gas balance that does not close within 2%, a missing or repeated month, exports above production.
  2. 2

    Correct the source, not the symptom

    A balance that does not close is usually a meter reading keyed in the wrong column or month. Correct the spreadsheet so the next month does not repeat it.
  3. 3

    Resubmit against the original

    From the returned submission, file the corrected file. The original is superseded — kept, with its findings, on the record — and the new one is validated from the start.
  4. 4

    Explain what is real

    A warning for a large movement is not a fault when the movement happened. Say what it was — a shutdown, a well test, a metering change — in the notes; the reviewer reads them.
Nothing is overwritten. Every version of a return stays on the record, so a figure published from an earlier one can always be reconstructed.

By API

An organisation's administrator can issue an API key for automated filing. The endpoints are the portal's, with the same validation and review; see the API & data dictionary.

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