Why preparation is key when drafting your 2020 IFRS financial statements

Maintaining compliance with the everchanging IFRS requirements can require much time and effort. EY offers a number of tools that can reduce the weight on your shoulders. 

Entities reporting under IFRS continue to face a steady flow of new standards and interpretations. The resulting changes range from significant amendments of fundamental principles to some minor changes from the annual improvements process. They will affect different areas of accounting, such as recognition, measurement, presentation and disclosure.

Some of the changes have implications that go beyond matters of accounting, also potentially impacting the information systems of many entities. Furthermore, the changes may impact business decisions, such as the creation of joint arrangements or the structuring of particular transactions.

The challenge for preparers is to gain an understanding of what lies ahead.

EY’s IFRS Core Tools

EY’s IFRS Core Tools are designed as practical building blocks to provide a comprehensive basis to keep up with the changing landscape of IFRS.

The Tools include the following:

• IFRS Update of standards and interpretations in issue at 30 September 2020
• Good Group (International) Limited - Illustrative financial statements
• International GAAP® Disclosure Checklist

Firstly, EY’s IFRS Update of standards and interpretations provides an overview of the upcoming changes in standards and interpretations (pronouncements). It also provides an update on selected active projects. It does not attempt to provide an in-depth analysis or discussion of the topics. Rather, the objective is to highlight key aspects of these changes. Reference should be made to the text of the pronouncements before taking any decisions or actions. The publication includes a table comparing mandatory application for different year ends presented at the beginning of Section 1. In the table, the pronouncements are presented in order of their effective dates.

Secondly, EY’s Good Group (International) Limited contains an illustrative set of consolidated financial statements for Good Group (International) Limited (the parent) and its subsidiaries (the Group) that is prepared in accordance with IFRS. This set of illustrative financial statements is one of many prepared by EY to assist you in preparing your own financial statements. The illustrative financial statements are intended to reflect transactions, events and circumstances that we consider to be most common for a broad range of companies across a wide variety of industries. Certain disclosures are included in these financial statements merely for illustrative purposes, even though they may be regarded as items or transactions that are not material for Good Group.

Finally, the International GAAP® Disclosure Checklist is designed to assist you in the preparation of financial statements in accordance with IFRS, as issued by the IASB, and in compliance with the disclosure requirements of IFRS. The checklist is available as an EY Intelligent Checklist. The scoping questions in the EY Intelligent Checklist save significant time, because they enable the user to filter the questionnaire to present only questions that are relevant to an entity’s annual financial statements.