ACFR XBRL/iXBRL Reporting*
ACFRs are a best practice in US local government reporting, but their formats are not easily extractable. XBRL has been recommended to improve data transparency and analysis, and the Financial Data Transparency Act (FDTA) now mandates adoption of an open data standard to digitize ACFRs.
*Annual Comprehensive Financial Reports (ACFRs) is not mandatory currently; it is a best practice in US local government reporting.
Digital ACFR Reporting
A Closer Look
An Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR) is a financial statement that government entities issue in accordance with the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) requirements. It outlines an entity’s annual spending, assets, and liabilities. ACFRs are issued by states, municipalities, and other government entities and summarize the annual reports of all the entity’s agencies.
ACFRs are a detailed presentation of a state’s financial condition, with introductory, financial, and statistical sections. However, the information in these reports is currently locked up in PDF format, which makes it difficult to aggregate and analyze financial performance across government entities.
ACFRs need to be standardized in a machine-readable format, such as eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) to facilitate better decision-making. XBRL has a proven track record of revolutionizing corporate compliance reporting globally and is the ideal open data standard for this purpose.
Who Is It Applicable For
State and federal government agencies are required to produce their ACFR under GASB (Government Accounting Standards Board) requirements (Annual Comprehensive Financial Reports) as part of their obligation to provide financial information and insight into the financial performance of the agency.
The ACFR Taxonomy
XBRL US and the University of Michigan have recently released a local government taxonomy that comprises over 2,800 digital concepts based on government reporting.
Benefits of Digital Reporting
A few benefits of publishing ACFRs in XBRL are greater information transparency, easier analysis of local government financial information, and lower reporting costs.
How Can Local Governments Comply?
Local governments can use software solutions provided by various vendors to prepare their ACFRs, however, only a few of them have the capability to generate an XBRL/iXBRL output of the ACFRs.
In July 2018, XBRL US, a not-for-profit national consortium for business reporting standards announced the creation of a State and Local Government Disclosure Modernization Working Group aimed at developing machine-readable reporting for ACFRs. IRIS Business Services LLC, our local subsidiary is a member of this working group, working with various stakeholders in facilitating the adoption of XBRL for ACFRs. IRIS contributed in multiple ways, providing several of their products for various pilots and proof of concept initiatives with interested several state agencies across the US. IRIS contributed to the development of the working group taxonomy, participated in pilots facilitating the conversion of several ACFRs into XBRL/iXBRL documents, and in demonstrating the value of XBRL for real-time analytics.
As part of a pilot project, we assisted Michigan’s County of Ogemaw, Pine River Township, and the City of South Haven in preparing their ACFRs in iXBRL. IRIS played a significant role in creating a “commercial grade” XBRL taxonomy through a project organized by XBRL US and the University of Michigan’s Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy (CLOSUP).
In line with the Financial Data Transparency Act
Machine-readable + Human-readable
Improves Fund Flows to Municipal Bonds
IRIS CARBON® for ACFR Reporting
IRIS CARBON® facilitates ACFR reporting by offering a hassle-free compliance solution for the iXBRL Reporting. You can choose to either utilize our cutting-edge technology to generate top-notch iXBRL reports or delegate the task to our seasoned team of XBRL professionals.
What Our Clients Say
We sometimes have announcements that need to be filed with the SEC at short notice. I was looking for a self-filing platform, bundled with expert XBRL support, at an all-inclusive price. IRIS CARBON® ticked off all these boxes.
We sometimes have announcements that need to be filed with the SEC at short notice. I was looking for a self-filing platform, bundled with expert XBRL support, at an all-inclusive price. IRIS CARBON® ticked off all these boxes.
The Carbon platform makes it really easy to prepare and disclose our reports in the way the SEC requires. It is pretty intuitive, similar to most text editing tools.
A great product with excellent customer support. The product supports both self-service mode and hands-off outsourcing mode.
Very intuitive product with an excellent document editor, version management, and compare feature. An excellent transition workshop and an extremely helpful support team helped us transition smoothly from our current processes to the platform!
I want to thank you for all your support in the process of preparing Natura’s XBRL in record time. It was a big challenge, but with your commitment and the whole team to adjust the XBRL in less than a week, we managed to achieve a very important goal for the company.
Unparalleled XBRL Expertise at your Service
IRIS has been into XBRL-based regulatory compliance for over 17 years now. We call ourselves XBRL evangelists and take pride in having contributed to the development of the data format. We have worked with 30+ global regulators and have helped some of them develop the XBRL taxonomies filers need to use.
Apart from the SEC’s iXBRL mandate, we also facilitate XBRL filings with the US FERC. In Europe, we help companies file iXBRL reports under the ESEF mandate; in the UK, we facilitate iXBRL filings with the FCA and HMRC; in South Africa, we have built the CIPC’s iXBRL report collection platform and also provide compliance services to companies.
- Outsourcing & In-house Compliance
- Unlimited XBRL Expert Support
- Scalable Solution for Newer Filing Needs
- Constant Focus on High-quality Filings
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