DCCI for raising threshold limit for financial reporting of SMEs

Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DCCI) has called for increasing the threshold limit for financial reporting of the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) under the Financial Reporting Act.

DCCI President Shams Mahmud made the call in a meeting with Dr Md Hamid Ullah Bhuiyan, chairman of Financial Reporting Council (FRC), Bangladesh, at the latter's office on Tuesday, reads a press release.

He said the threshold limits are too low or strict and will extremely be difficult to maintain by organisations, most of which will be SMEs, practically and financially. 

As per Financial Reporting Act 2015, all entities with an annual sales or revenue of Tk5 crore and fulfilling any of the two conditions of either having employment of 50 people or having a total property value of Tk3 crore or having a total liability of Tk1 crore will be treated as Public Interest Entities (PIEs).  

As per the act, the FRC will review and monitor the preparation, auditing, and reporting of all financial statements of those PIEs. 

The SMEs cannot afford to maintain professional accounting personnel to prepare the financial reporting as per the International Financial Reporting Standards and International Accounting Standards, as they generally have a very low capital base, and are non-structured and non-technology-oriented organisations, the DCCI president added.

He also sought an all-out cooperation from the FRC to facilitate the country's SME sector to be more competitive in the world market.

FRC Chairman Dr Hamid assured that he would look into the issues seriously and would try to accommodate the requests as much as possible.

During the discussion, the DCCI president congratulated the newly-appointed FRC chairman.

DCCI Senior Vice President NKA Mobin was also present at the meeting.