An administrative burden may, for example, be a request, an obligation to communicate data, to keep documents or to formalise them; in short, it is any activity of an administrative nature that a company or a citizen must carry out in order to comply with the obligations arising from the legislation.

The reduction of administrative burdens makes it possible to reduce the costs of setting up or operating companies and to devote these liberated resources to other activities, thus improving the productivity and competitiveness of the economy.

The techniques used include, for example, the elimination of unnecessary obligations, the failure to require documents or data held by the administrations, the reduction of the frequency of requests for data, the shortening of the time-limits for processing procedures or the electronic submission of applications, communications and other documents.

The measurement, which is of an estimative nature, is carried out by applying the simplified method of measuring administrative burdens and their reduction (Annex V of the Methodological Guide for the elaboration of the Normative Impact Analysis Report) from three values: the COST of meeting the load, the FREQUENCY with which it must be carried out and the POPULATION that must comply.