School District PSAB Conversion Project

The June 30, 2013 financial statements and budgets of School Districts will be prepared following Public Sector Accounting Standards (PSAB) without not-for-profit provisions (see Treasury Board directives below). The Ministry is currently working on the format that will be used by school districts for their financial statement reporting. The 2012/13 PSAB Annual Budget template and instructions can be found at Budget Reporting. The 2013 financial statements must also present “restated” figures for June 30, 2012 as well as an opening balance sheet as at July 1, 2011 (the date of transition). As this is a work in progress, please consider the files below very preliminary “drafts” of these formats. They were originally provided in anticipation of the PSAB workshop at BCASBO’s May 2011 conference in Penticton. These files are being replaced as updates become available.

The Ministry in conjunction with external auditors and the Accounting Advisory Committee have identified issues that require Treasury Board and/or Comptroller General approval before implementation. Treasury Board wants to ensure that all SUCH entities follow the same accounting principles whenever an option is available. Treasury Board decisions may result in changes to these draft statements.

Most of the conversion issues will result from the different presentation of your account balances in the PSAB financial statements. The only significant account balance adjustment will be for Employee Future Benefits in order to increase the liability for non-vested benefits, recognize the unamortized actuarial gain (loss) and to apply the PSAB discount rate. The Ministry, in conjunction with Mercer, will be providing an actuarial tool for the preparation of your June 30, 2013 audited financial statements that will calculate your balances, adjustments and note disclosures for July 1, 2011, June 30, 2012 and June 30, 2013.

PSAB and the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) have prepared PSAB conversion documents that you may find useful, such as comparisons of PSAB with CICA standards. School Districts will be using the financial statement format as provided by the Ministry and not the model statements shown on the OAG website. The links are provided below.