The Financial Reporting Council issued amendments (27th July 2015) to the UK accounting standards, ushering in a new financial reporting framework for small and micro-entities. The changes are mainly as a result of the new EU Accounting Directive.
The key changes are:
FRSSE has been withdrawn
FRS102 – A new section has been added to FRS102 with disclosure requirements for Small Companies
FRS105 will be the new reporting standard for Micro-Entities
The changes come into effect from 1st January 2016.
Generally Accepted Accounting Practice in the UK, or UK GAAP, is the overall body of regulation establishing how company accounts must be prepared in the United Kingdom. This includes not only accounting standards, but also UK company law. (Wikipedia)
UK GAAP was over 3,000 pages, but in March 2013 the new Financial Reporting Standard – FRS 102 – was finalised. It’s a mere 342 pages and will succeed UK GAAP and bring the UK closer to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).
FRS 102 will be mandatory for periods beginning on or after 1st January 2015 but you can adopt it for periods ending after 31st December 2012.
It will apply to all entities with the main exceptions being:
Those small companies who have adopted FRSSE (Financial Reporting Standard Small Entities)
Those companies applying IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards)
The Financial Reporting Council (FRC), in an article in Financial Director Magazine April 2013, claim:
UK GAAP provided inadequate guidance on accounting for financial instruments
There were inconsistencies in standards between IFRS and older standards
Trainee accountants now learn IFRS so knowledge of UK GAAP is being lost
FRS 102 allows for benchmarking which could lead to reduced borrowing costs
There are a number of key areas which you should start to consider now so that you can prepare for FRS 102:
Financial Instruments (FI) – FRS 102 deals with FI in two chapters: Chapter 11 deals with basic FI such as debtors, creditors and simple loans, chapter 12 deals with more complex FI such as forward contracts, interest rate swaps and derivatives. Basic FI will continue to be recognised at amortised cost, however, the more complex transactions that fall into Chapter 12 will need to be measured at fair value with movements being recognised in P&L a/c.
Business Combinations – For most acquisitions accounted for under FRS 10 intangible assets such as brands, customer lists etc are mainly rolled into the goodwill figure rather than recognised separately. Under FRS 102 it is more likely that intangible assets will be recognised separately from goodwill and each might well be amortised over different useful lives.
Investment Property – FRS 102 requires revaluation gains and losses on investment properties are recognised directly in P&L a/c rather than the current procedure under UK GAAP which is for gains and losses to be held in the Statement of Total Recognised Gains and Losses (STRGL) until realised. This is likely to lead to more volatility in the P&L a/c.
Deferred Tax – changes to the deferred tax treatment of revaluations of property, plant, equipment and investment property, fair value adjustments under business combinations, unremitted earnings of overseas associates and joint ventures are likely to result in more deferred tax entries in the future.
The disclosure requirements for Related Party Transactions in published accounts are a common cause of confusion, on the face of it, its sounds easy but getting it right is often a balance between compliance and relevance. The rules are set out in the Companies Act 2006, FRS8 and for smaller companies FRSSE (April 2008). The rules apply to both Full and Abbreviated Accounts.
FRS 8 defines a related party to include an entity’s subsidiaries, associates, joint venture interests, directors and close family members of directors.
The standard requires an entity’s transactions with related parties, regardless of whether a price is charged, to be disclosed in that entity’s financial statements.
FRS 8 section 3 and FRSSE section 15.7 states that disclosure of the following is not required:
Pension contributions paid to a pension fund
Emoluments in respect of services as an employee or the reporting entity
Transactions with parties simply because of their role as:
Providers of Finance
Utility Companies
Government Departments
Customer, Supplier, Franchiser, Distributor or Agent
The disclosure under FRS8 and FRSSE should include:
(a) the names of the transacting related parties
(b) a description of the relationship between the parties
(c) a description of the transactions
(d) the amounts involved
(e) any other elements of the transactions necessary for an understanding of the financial statements
(f) the amounts due to or from related parties at the balance sheet date and provisions for doubtful debts due from such parties at that date
(g) amounts written off in the period in respect of debts due to or from related parties.
Dividends to directors do meet the definition of related party transactions and are disclosable as such.
Trival items don’t require disclosure and the principle of materiality should be applied.
An item of information is material to the financial statements if its misstatement or omission might reasonably be expected to influence the economic decisions of users of those financial statements, including their assessments of management’s stewardship.
The Companies Act 2006 places a statutory duty on directors in relation to potential conflicts of interest:
A director must “avoid a situation in which he has, or can have, a direct or indirect interest that conflicts, or possibly may conflict, with the interests of the company”.
Related Party Transactions will often create a potential conflict of interest.
Authorisation may be given by the directors—
(a)where the company is a private company and nothing in the company’s constitution invalidates such authorisation, by the matter being proposed to and authorised by the directors; or (b)where the company is a public company and its constitution includes provision enabling the directors to authorise the matter, by the matter being proposed to and authorised by them in accordance with the constitution.
The authorisation is effective only if—
(a)any requirement as to the quorum at the meeting at which the matter is considered is met without counting the director in question or any other interested director, and (b)the matter was agreed to without their voting or would have been agreed to if their votes had not been counted.
So it is vital that Directors disclose any potential conflict of interest and seek authorisation from the Board of Directors.
It’s a common issue and area of confusion and it has tax implications. WIP is valued at the lower of cost or net realisable value but Debtors whether invoiced or not are valued at Sales Value, uninvoiced Sales are shown as Amounts Recoverable on Contracts within Debtors.
Here is an example from HMRC
A joiner contracts to create fitted bookcases in an office for a total price of £15,000. He purchases the timber (materials cost £6,000) and builds the doors in his workshop. He also prepares the timber for the rest of the structure in his workshop. He then builds the skeleton of the bookcases on the customer’s premises and attaches thereto the timber that he has already prepared in his workshop. What is the accounts treatment if his year end occurs after he has prepared the timber and the doors but before he has gone to the customer’s premises to build the skeleton and fit them?
The contract is a single contract and the joiner should recognise revenue according to the stage of completion of the work. It is not relevant whether the work is done at his workshop or at the client’s premises. Neither is it relevant that part of the contract can be regarded as ‘goods’ and part as ‘services’: both are treated in the same way for accounting purposes.
Let us assume the joiner assesses that he has done 1/3 of the work by the year end and he has used half of the timber and other materials. The calculation would be: total price £15,000 less materials at cost (£6,000) leaves £9,000. Assuming the profit attaches only to the labour, accrued income is £3,000 (1/3 complete) plus materials at cost of £3,000 ( a half used), a total of £6,000. The remaining half of the total cost of the materials (£3,000) is work in progress. These figures should then be adjusted to reflect any likely losses, discounts, delay in payment or cost of difficulties expected to arise in completing the contract. Any progress payments received should be treated as creditors in accordance with SSAP 9.
