The European Union supported the implementation of the International Accounting Standards due to which for two years all companies operating on EU stock exchanges have been using the same standards to draw up consolidated financial statements.
In Polish law the IAS appeared in the amended Accounting Act of 2000. A considerable part of its provisions and regulations issued on the basis thereof were directly based on suitable standards.
Moreover, keeping up with globalization, also in Poland it is allowed, and in some cases even required, that International Financial Reporting Standards (former IRS) be used as official principles of reporting.
The obligation to prepare consolidated financial statements in compliance with the IFRS has been imposed on banks and units admitted into trade on one of the regulated markets of the countries belonging to the European Economic Area. The following units, in turn, have the possibility of drawing up standards compliant with the IFRS:
- in terms of drawing up consolidated financial statements – issuers applying for admission into public trade in Poland or on one of the regulated markets of the EEA countries;
- in terms of preparing individual financial statements – issuers of securities admitted into public trade in Poland or in one of the regulated markets of EEA countries, issuers applying for admission into public trade in Poland or on one of the regulated markets of the EEA countries or units belonging to the capital group (subsidiaries and co-subsidiaries), in which consolidated financial statements are drawn up by a dominant unit in compliance with the IFRS.
What transpires from the inspection of financial statements prepared in the past years in compliance with the IFRS is that by virtue of the absence of clear guidelines concerning the actual style of reporting, the preparation of an in-house reporting style, namely, attention to detail and a clear but also reader-friendly image related to the activity conducted, should be the most important objective.
In practice, few companies in Poland actually apply the IFRS. Numerous units belonging to international concerns prepare financial information in compliance with requirements presented by dominant units. Where a company is not subject to statutory reporting requirements this is the only kind of reporting units prepare.
