Accountants Face Exceptional Challenges For The End Of 2020 And Beyond

With the COVID-19 pandemic causing more uncertainty and disruption, this has led to an increase in challenges in auditing financial statements for accountants. Not only this, but extra difficulties have come to light with regards to Brexit and the transition period finishing on 31st December 2020. Not only this, but climate change has become another important topic of 2020 as well as COVID-19 and Brexit.

These three key issues are predicted to alter areas of financial statements. This is because investors will want to gain information that will clearly explain how directors of businesses have responded to their implications. Transparency will be vital for this to occur.

Directors will also be obliged to review every area of every financial statement, which will be subject to judgement and estimation uncertainty. Furthermore, forecasting will also play a vital part in conducting impairment as well as concern reviews. The uncertainty of all this could require help from other sources.

Soon auditors will have to demonstrate levels of professional scepticism. This increased uncertainty amongst financial professionals will mean that they will need to take an approach that involves seeking good-quality corroborative evidence as well as evidence derived from different sources.

Those preparing annual reports are urged to commence the planning early due to the challenges in the upcoming reporting season. There must be a focus on transparency and engagement across organisations to gather information with auditors. It is also important to think about the reporting deadlines and making their scope as flexible as possible because of the extraordinary challenges that will be occurring for auditors and preparers. These challenges will not only be affecting their professional lives, but COVID-19, Brexit and the climate crisis will affect the personal lives of auditors too.

The key lessons that we can learn in preparation for this are to be as organised and flexible as possible to meet these deadlines. Preparing for the worst financial scenarios due to the three key challenges will also be important in ensuring no more challenges will arise from the ones already established.

The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) provides lots of relevant resources and will be able to develop these resources to the changes which are occurring at the end of 2020. They offer technical support with regards to the COVID-19 situation with information for auditors and preparers free of charge.

Take a look at my blog here to see how some UK accountants are voicing their concerns about their environmental worries.