Belgium's Transition to Accrual Accounting - Marc De Spiegeleire, Belgium

Marc De Spiegeleire

16th OECD Annual Symposium - Paris, 21-22 March 2016

17 March, 2016 Federal Public Service – Budget

Federal Ministry of Budget Belgium 1

Introduction

Regulatory State of Play

System & Accounting Design & Rollout

Objectives

Remaining challenges

Lessons learned



From Cash Accounting to Accrual Accounting



Legal Framework Governance – Key Dates



• 1991: Starting point of the Reform of Public Sector Accounting • 1991 - 2003: legislative work. • 2003: New Public Sector Accounting Law - May 22nd 2003. • 2009: Standardized Chart of Accounts published by Royal Decree • 2010: Creation of the Public Sector Accounting Commission (CCP). • 2010 - xxxx: Regular updates of the Law of May 22nd 2003. • Upcoming next: Review national Law on compliance with IPSAS or

EPSAS.

“Fedcom” project Governance – key dates



• 2001 - 2007: Feasibility studies and contract negotiations • 2007 - 2008: Blueprint & design fase • 2009: Go-live Pilot with 4 Federal Public Services (FPS), • 2012: Go-live of last Roll-out wave • ≥ 2013 - 2014: Stabilization & consolidation of existing system • ≥ 2015 - 2017: Further development & enhancements of the system

2nd BIG

Challenge

Framework for accounting and financial internal control enabling to improve:

Transparency

True and Fair Value

Management information opportunities

Harmonisation of general government accounting standards,

Process and quality of internal control in federal state public entities,



Publish annual financial statements



A new ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), “Fedcom” (based on SAP):

Dedicated to financial, budgetary and analytic accounting management,

Shared at Federal level,

Improvement of the audit trail.

3.500 daily users



Constrains

Goals



Extended accounting system to include automated links between: Accrual accounting Budgetary accounting Analytical Management accounting

A

B

C

Fiscal revenues still recorded on cash basis Work in progress

Achieve transition period for Fixed Assets Transition period ending in 2016

Provisions (exhaustivity) Under review

Move to Accrual Budgeting Not yet planned



Key factors to success Involvement from Administration and politics

Openess for Change en process re-engineering

Appropriate training on accounting and system usage

Need to enforce standardized processes & best practices acceptance

Try to combine the move to accrual Accounting with the move to accrual Budgeting

17 March, 2016

Federal Public Service – Budget Federal Ministry of Budget Belgium 11



Government & Nonprofit

Belgium's Transition to Accrual Accounting - Marc De Spiegeleire, Belgium