The Friendly Societies (Accounts and Related Provisions) Regulations 1994

Content and form of accounts

6.—(1) An income and expenditure account and balance sheet referred to in regulations 4, 5 and 11 must be prepared in accordance with the relevant notes and every such document must, subject to the following paragraphs of this regulation, be prepared in the order and under the headings and subheadings in the format applicable to it.

(2) Regulations 4, 5 and 11 are not to be read as:

(a)requiring the heading or sub-heading for any item to be distinguished by any letter or number assigned to that item in the format in which it appears;

(b)prohibiting the showing of any item in a particular account in greater detail than is required by the format for that particular account; or

(c)prohibiting the insertion of additional items, providing that their contents are not specifically covered by any of the items prescribed in the formats.

(3) Items preceded by lower case letter in any format set out in Schedule 1, 2 or 7 may be combined in a society’s annual accounts for any financial year if either:

(a)their individual amounts are not material to assessing:

(i)in respect of any income and expenditure account, the income and expenditure of the society (or, as the case may be, the society and its subsidiaries) for that year; and

(ii)in respect of a balance sheet, the state of affairs of the society (or, as the case may be, the society and its subsidiaries) as at the end of that year; or

(b)their combination facilitates that assessment,

provided that where subparagraph (b) above applies, the individual amounts of any items so combined must be disclosed in a note to the annual accounts.

(4) Subject to paragraph (5) below, a heading or sub-heading for an item contained in any format set out in Schedule 1, 2 or 7 must not be included if there is no amount to be shown for that item in respect of the financial year to which the annual accounts relate (and a total need not be included if, as a result of this paragraph, it would be composed of a single item).

(5) For the purpose of comparing particular accounts with those for the preceding financial year:

(a)in respect of every item shown in a balance sheet and income and expenditure account, the corresponding amount for the preceding financial year must be shown;

(b)where that corresponding amount is not comparable with the amount to be shown for the item in question in respect of the financial year to which the annual accounts relate, the former amount must be adjusted and particulars of the adjustment and the reasons for it must be disclosed in a note to the annual accounts; and

(c)paragraph (4) above does not apply in any case where an amount can be shown for the item to which the heading or sub-heading relates in respect of the preceding financial year, and in such a case that amount must be shown under the heading or sub-heading required for that item.

(6) Subject to the provisions of Schedules 1, 2 and 7, amounts in respect of items representing assets or income may not be set off against amounts in respect of items representing liabilities or expenditure (as the case may be), or vice versa.

(7) In this regulation, “the relevant notes” means, in relation to any particular account, Part III of Schedule 1, Part III and Part IV of Schedule 2 or Part III of Schedule 7, whichever is applicable.