Mazars gets updated with BizFinx Preparation Tool

In October later this year, the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority of Singapore (ACRA) will be launching a new initiative to enhance the dissemination of comprehensive and useful business information to the business community through the implementation of BizFinx.

BizFinx shall replace the current FS Manager which will subsequently cease to exist.

This shift will enable XBRL to go beyond being merely a form of reporting language for companies’ financial statements to become an effective and efficient mechanism for the dissemination of information that companies may use for their analysis and/or benchmarking.

One of the most salient changes under the shift will be that companies will no longer have the option of partial filing (Option B under the current FS manager). Companies will need to prepare and upload the full set of financial statements “FS”, in accordance with a “Minimum Requirement List” within the new ACRA taxonomy 2013.

The Minimum Requirement List is a set of elements within the ACRA Taxonomy 2013. Companies are required to file the information only if the information is available in the FS. This is less burdensome than the current system whereby companies are requiredto submit certain mandatory information.

The preparation will also be made easier with the availability of offline preparation tools. Previously, the FS Manager was only available while online.

The parties affected by this shift will be all Singapore incorporated companies which are unlimited or limited by shares, required to file their FS with ACRA and filing financial statements with periods ending on or after 30 April 2007. The current filing arrangements for periods before the afore-mentioned periods will remain unchanged.

Exempt Private Companies (EPC) which are exempted from filing their FS will be unaffected. The following types of companies will also remain exempted from filing the full set of their Financial Statements. Instead they will only need to file the FS in PDF with the Financial Statements Highlights in the XBRL format instead.

Companies which are (1) Commercial Banks; (2) Merchant Banks; (3) Registered Insurers; and (4) Finance Companies, that are regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore; and
Companies allowed by law to prepare accounts in accordance with accounting standards other than SFRS, SFRS for Small Entities and IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards).

Companies limited by guarantee will continue to file only their financial statements in PDF format to ACRA.

Insolvent EPCs will have the following options to file their financial statements with ACRA:

A full set of financial statements in XBRL format; or
A full set of financial statements in PDF with Financial Statements Highlights in XBRL format.

In order to facilitate the shift from FS Manager to BizFinx, ACRA will be providing the BizFinx preparation tool free-of-charge. This will be done in 2 phases:

A beta version was released in June 2013 to enable companies to familiarize themselves with the functions of the tool and the elements of the Minimum Requirement List.

The final version will be released in August 2013. This version will incorporate further enhancements as gathered from the public feedback after the public consultation exercise that was carried out from March to April 2013.

The Mazars audit, accounting and company secretarial teams in Singapore have been trained on the changes. Please do not hesitate to contact us should you require assistance.