A new service offered by a UK regulator will
allow companies, investors and advisors to come up with solutions
for accounting issues.
The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) will
launch the Financial Reporting Lab on 14 October to act as an
enabling service providing solutions to accounting anomalies or
variances showing up in financial reporting.
The FRC says the Lab,
which will sit within the current regulatory framework, will be a
forum for companies and
investors to identify financial reporting
issues and then come up with solutions with the regulator acting as
a sounding board. Wider accounting issues could also be discussed
through an industry-by-industry approach.
Discussions between parties will remain
confidential. However, the lab plans to report on the lessons
learned when appropriate.
The regulator added that it will be unable to
‘pre-clear’ sets of accounts from further investigation that are
subject to discussions.
According to the FRC there is already interest
from corporate and investment communities.
