Madrid: 5 March 2010

The Spanish Asociación Multisectorial de la Información (ASEDIE) has published a press release () () titled: Comments and suggestions of the “Asociacion Multsectorial de la Informacion” on the costs reduction for small companies (review of the accounting Directives) - COMENTARIOS Y SUGERENCIAS DE LA ASOCIACION MULTISECTORIAL DE LA INFORMACIÓN SOBRE LA REDUCCION DE COSTES PARA LAS PEQUEÑAS EMPRESAS (REVISION DE LAS DIRECTIVAS DE CONTABILIDAD)

The press release sets out the Back ground, the Current situation, the consequences (as viewed by ASEDIE) of the proposed by the European Commission Directive and then puts forward proposals for reducing the financial accounting practices on micro and SME’s.

The press release states in the section Background:

“On 26 February 2009, the European Commission published a working document of the services commission (DG Internal Market) under the title “Cutting Accounting Burden for Small Business /Review of the Accounting Directives”.

This document is the third step for the simplification of the accounting rules for Small and Medium sized Companies in the EU. Its basic idea is to reduce 25% administrative costs for these companies before 2012. This document's innovation is the creation of the "microbusiness" category that would not have the obligation to file annual accounts.

This micro business category would include all those companies that had less than 250 employees, which would in reality mean that, in case of the directive being approved, 90% of the Spanish companies would have to stop publishing its accounts in the Registry.”

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The proposals put forward on pages 3 and 4 of the press release state:

“ALTERNATIVE MEASURES FOR ACCOUNTING SIMPLIFICATION AND LOWERING OF COSTS FOR MICRO-ENTITIES.

The following measures will enable a substantial reduction in the administrative burdens of micro-entities.

A) To make the different European registers interoperable in the shared disclosure of accounts with business owners and in the elimination of duplicated accounting duties by reason of the opening of branches and consolidated accounts.

B) To design simplified contents for the annual accounts of micro-entities.

C) To obligate the administrations of the Member States of the Union not to demand accounting documents from micro-entities for certain purposes, such as statistics, business activity supervision, licenses, etc., when said information can be obtained by simply accessing the posted accounts, to avoid the double imposition of public information duties.

D) To make available to users, free of charge, software informing them of accounting contents and obligations and, in addition, including the possibility of running tests for arithmetic and logical errors which can function with the standardised account specimen forms, in order to set off warning signals.

E) To regulate procedures for the user to connect directly, from the source, with the register in order to send in electronic documents on line without there being any obligation for the micro-entity owner to have accounting documents formalised on paper or to have the document sent authenticated.”

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The Spanish language press release states:

“MEDIDAS ALTERNATIVAS PARA SIMPLIFICACIÓN CONTABLE Y REDUCCIÓN DE COSTES EN MICRO-ENTIDADES.

Las siguientes medidas permitirán una reducción substancial de las cargas administrativas de

las micro-entidades.

A) Hacer que los diferentes registros europeos puedan interoperar en la presentación conjunta de cuentas con propietarios de negocios y en la eliminación de obligaciones de cuentas duplicadas por apertura de sucursales y cuentas consolidadas.

B) Diseñar contenidos simplificados para las cuentas anuales de micro-entidades.

C) Obligar a las administraciones de los Estados Miembros de la Unión Europea a no solicitar documentos contables de micro-empresas para algunos fines como estadísticas, supervisar la actividad comercial, licencias, etc., cuando dicha información pueda obtenerse simplemente accediendo a las cuentas presentadas, para evitar la doble imposición de las obligaciones de información pública.

D) Poner a disposición de los usuarios, sin cargo, software que les informe de los contenidos y obligaciones contables así como que incluyese además la posibilidad de llevar a cabo pruebas de errores lógicos y aritméticos que podrían funcionar con las plantillas de las cuentas estándar, para poder establecer señales de alarma.

E) Regular los procedimientos para que el usuario se conecte directamente, desde la fuente, con el registro para poder enviar documentación electrónica online sin que haya obligación para los propietarios de las micro-entidades de tener documentos contables formalizados en papel o tener que autentificar la documentación enviada.”

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