Not for Profit

Charities are not businesses and therefore create surpluses or deficits in their income and expenditure.  These are accumulated year on year as fund, which are also described as reserves. Under the Charity SORP the surpluses and deficits are recorded against each [...]

The Statement of Financial Activities is the charitable equivalent of a Profit & Loss report for ordinary businesses, which is extended by including balance sheet information for the movement in the funds. It uses standard classifications of income and expense which [...]

Three-dimensional accounting simplifies the implementation of the Charity SORP. On every type of income (sales invoice) you record not only the classification of the income using the nominal or general ledger code for that income type, but also the fund that [...]

The SORP is extremely difficult to implement properly unless you have a multi-dimensional accounting system like Aedon.Accounting. Most charities use starter packages which have a business-oriented chart of accounts that might allow for different departments or cost centres, but certainly don’ [...]

The SORP is extremely difficult to implement properly unless you have a multi-dimensional accounting system like Aedon.Accounting. Most charities use starter packages which have a business-oriented chart of accounts that might allow for different departments or cost centres, but certainly don’ [...]

The SORP was created by some very clever and very experienced accountants, who were probably too clever and too experienced to recognise that what they had produced was far too complicated for charities many of whom rely on unqualified volunteers to [...]

The aim of the Financial Reporting Council is "to promote transparency and integrity in business". With regards to charities the aim is to help readers understand three things in particular: What are the objectives of the charity? What activities does it [...]

Yes!  There are some minor changes in the Trustee’s Report for "small" charities which are defined as those with a gross income of less than £500,000 for UK charities or €500,000 for Irish.

The Charity Statement of Recommended Practice is mandatory for all charities - regardless of size. It is a 200-page A4 document of additional reporting requirements that are layered on top of FRS 102. Unfortunately, and unintentionally, the SORP is ambiguous and [...]