PolitiFact's Ucci correction/update

PolitiFact published another flub recently, putting to virtual print an incorrect dollar figure as part of a story about bank security.

This flub helps illustrate the way PolitiFact exercises its corrections policy when its editors feel something must be done.

Here's the policy:

When we find we've made a mistake, we correct the mistake.

• In the case of a factual error, an editor's note will be added and labeled "CORRECTION" explaining how the article has been changed.
• In the case of clarifications or updates, an editor's note will be added and labeled "UPDATE" explaining how the article has been changed.
• If the mistake is significant, we will reconvene the three-editor panel. If there is a new ruling, we will rewrite the item and put the correction at the top indicating how it's been changed.

Here is the result of the policy:

Update: The initial version of this item incorrectly reported the amount of money stolen in the 2010 robbery outside a bank. It was $12,542.

Getting the number wrong probably seems like a "factual error" to most of us.  Apparently at PolitiFact a "factual error" is something a bit worse than publishing the wrong figure.  Maybe the original version of the story was only off by a dollar or two?  The "Update" shows the amount stolen "was" $12,542.  "Was" in actuality or "was" in the original version?  Let's check the figure in the updated version:

On the morning of Sept. 20, 2010,  a 49-year-old service station manager brought a deposit bag with $12,542 to a Citizen Bank branch in Woonsocket. A man in a ski mask confronted him outside the bank and demanded the money.

The $12,542 figure "was" the correct figure, then.  And PolitiFact's clarification does a perfect job of keeping you from knowing how PolitiFact had it wrong--unless you do a bit of digging and locate a cached version of the original story.  In which case it reads like this:

On the morning of Sept. 20, 2010,  a 49-year-old service station manager brought a deposit bag with $1,242 to a Citizen Bank branch in Woonsocket. A man in a ski mask confronted him outside the bank and demanded the money.

Publishing a figure off by a factor of (approximately) 10 is apparently not a "factual error."  Most likely the error was bumped into "clarification" territory because it appears to have resulted from a typographical error (omitting the "5").

The clarification was notably lacking in transparency, however, when it comes to that.