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Originally Posted by Graeme
There are numerous reports by pilots in which the balloon is not actually seen to catch fire, simply that upon looking back, the balloon was no longer visible but smoke was seen at the location. As to how many of these "victories" should be excluded is anybody's guess.
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I'm not defending false claims, but we should be aware that some which appear to be false after a cursory review may, in fact, be genuine.
There are scads of records of German balloons which were attacked and damaged (but not flamed), and as a result, the Balloonzug had to inflate its secondary balloon (each unit held one spare balloon in reserve) while the first was taken out of action. So a pilot could damage a balloon, force it to the ground and force its removal from service for repair and possibly remove the observer from action for a period of time as well, but never have claimed a kill.
That may not account for all the potential exclusions you speak of, but it did happen many times; enough to be a major factor in such quantifications.