"1.0 Genuine Sales
1.1
All sales information used to compile the Chart must be recorded as a result of a genuine purchase by a genuine consumer.
No record company, distributor, retailer, Artist or other party should act or encourage others to act in any way designed to distort, or which has the effect of distorting the Chart by achieving a higher or lower Chart position for a record than it would otherwise achieve.
Actions which will be considered a breach of these rules include:
a) promoting the sale of any album by supplying a dealer with records by another artist free of charge or upon terms more favourable than would be the case but for that promotion;
b) purchasing albums or causing albums to be purchased other than as a genuine consumer purchase;
c) multiple purchases of albums on behalf of other persons,
d) interference with the operation of sales recording machines or other equipment or computer software used to compile the Charts or collect or collate its information or in any other way being a party to the submission of false or inaccurate data to the Chart compiler;
e) offering money or other benefits to a dealer contingent upon an album entering any of the Charts or attaining a minimum chart position;
f) procuring the sale of an album in conjunction with a non-related or excessive gift, ie which gives the consumer a product, voucher or benefit or anything else which is either unrelated to the album concerned or of a value in excess of the value of the record without that gift (value means normal retail price), where it is not an album and merchandise package as outlined in section 8.0.
g) any other activity intended unfairly to influence Chart positions.
- Where the Official Charts Company has reason to believe that an album is the subject of any of the above types of activity, it will, at its discretion, either remove identifiable irregular sales transactions from the data used to compile the Chart, or exclude the record from the Chart with immediate effect.
- The Official Charts Company´s nominated chart compiler will ensure the accuracy and completeness of any sales information provided to it by a retail outlet in the sample to the extent it is possible to do so using Good Industry Practice. Where the nominated chart compiler has reason to believe that the inclusion of sales from a retail outlet or a number of retail outlets maybe inaccurate, misleading or incomplete and run contrary to the guidelines expected by a skilled and experienced market research firm, then the store(s) in question will be excluded from the sample to avoid potential distortion.
- If an album is excluded from the Chart, the Official Charts Company will inform the record company, distributor, ERA and the BPI in writing on the first working day after the exclusion takes effect. If unusual or irregular sales transactions cause the Official Charts Company to remove data from the Chart sample, the Official Charts Company will inform the Secretariat of the BPI and/or ERA, as appropriate, on the first working day after the data is removed.
