FINANCIAL STATEMENT RISK ASSESSMENT AND MANAGEMENT SYSTEM AND METHOD

• US 20100121746A1
• Filed: 11/13/2009
• Published: 05/13/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 11/13/2008
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: EZ Decisions LLC
• Original Assignee: EZ Decisions LLC
• Inventors: Littman, Scott, SCHOENFELD, MARC
• Application Number:
  US12/618,218
• Publication Number:
  US 20100121746A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/30
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/00 Finance; Insurance; Tax strategies; Processing of corporate or income taxes
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/02 Banking, e.g. interest calculation or account maintenance credit or loans G06Q40/03
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/12 Accounting

Abstract

A method, computer readable storage medium, and information processing system analyze sources of internal organization financial information and decisions made that impact the risk of reporting errors in cash and non-cash components in line items of external financial reporting statements such as balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements. The information processing system displays to a user, via a user interface, cash and non-cash components of at least one line item of an external financial reporting statement, the internal decisions and judgments made to arrive at the cash and non-cash component amounts, and the risk of reporting errors being introduced in each line item due to these decisions and judgments.

Claims

1. A method, with an information processing system, for discriminating cash transactions from non-cash transactions for each line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization, the method comprising:

reverse tracing, with a processor, one line item in an external financial reporting statement to one or more internal financial systems data of an organization, each of the one or more internal financial systems data comprising at least one account;

segmenting, with a processor, each account in the one or more internal financial systems data by internal transaction codes of the organization that identify those accounts associated with cash receipts and those accounts associated with cash disbursements;

aggregating, with a processor, in a total cash receipts balance, all account balances that are identified as cash receipts of those accounts that are associated with the one line item in an external financial reporting statement by the reverse tracing;

aggregating, with a processor, in a total cash disbursements balance, all account balances that are identified as cash disbursements of those accounts that are associated with the one line item in the external financial reporting statement by the reverse tracing;

calculating, with a processor, a net cash balance associated with the first one line item based on the aggregated total cash disbursements balance and the aggregated total cash receipts balance; and

presenting, with a processor, to a user, via a user interface, the net cash balance associated with the one line item.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

repeating the reverse tracing, the segmenting, the aggregating a total cash receipts balance, the aggregating a total cash disbursements balance, and the calculating a net cash balance, for each of a plurality of line items in the external financial reporting statement; and

presenting, with a processor, to the user, via a user interface, a plurality of net cash balances associated with the plurality of line items, respectively.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

calculating, with a processor, a non-cash balance associated with the one line item in an external financial reporting statement based on the net cash balance associated with the one line item and a total balance of the one line item; and

displaying, with a processor, to the user the non-cash balance associated with the one line item in an external financial reporting statement.

4. A method, with an information processing system, for analyzing at least one non-cash valuation, accrual, and estimate, that has a non-cash impact on at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization, the method comprising:

identifying, with a processor, at least one Judgment, a Judgment comprising an aggregation of at least one non-cash valuation, accrual, and estimate, for a financial reporting period, and that is used to add to or subtract from cash basis revenues and expenses, to be booked to at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization;

identifying, with a processor, sources of information used in at least one of the Judgment and the calculation of the non-cash result from the Judgment to be booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement;

identifying, with a processor, significant guesses made in, and that have substantial impact on the non-cash result from, the Judgment;

defining, with a processor, control steps that ensure that

the significant guesses are visible to senior management of the organization, and

there is integrity in calculations and assumptions used in calculating the Judgment;

identifying, with a processor, metrics that indicate what is an expected non-cash result of calculating the Judgment;

defining, with a processor, a set of at least one automated analytical test that supports the validity of each element of the calculation of the non-cash result from the Judgment;

calculating, with a processor, one conclusion analytic that

defines what is the non-cash result from the calculation of the Judgment; and

combines all of the at least one automated analytical test and, based on the combination, provides a risk assessment value that indicates what additional risk is being taken by accepting the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement; and

providing, with a processor, to a user interface an indication of additional risk being taken by accepting the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the providing to a user interface comprises displaying, via the user interface, the indication of additional risk in association with the value of the at least one line item of the external financial reporting statement comprising the non-cash result from the Judgment.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the indication of additional risk comprises a colored light that indicates any one of acceptable risk by a green light, more than acceptable risk by a yellow light, and unacceptable risk by a red light.

7. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

prompting a user, via the user interface, to enter user input in the user interface that accepts the indicated additional risk being taken by accepting the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement.

8. The method of claim 4, wherein the at least one line item comprises a plurality of line items, each line item being associated with a respective non-cash result from a Judgment booked to the respective each line item, and the method further comprising:

providing to the user interface a plurality of indications of additional risk being taken by accepting the plurality of line items, each of the plurality of indications being associated with a respective one of the plurality of line items.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the providing of the plurality of indications of additional risk comprises

displaying via the user interface the indication of additional risk in association with the value of the respective line item of the plurality of line items comprising the respective non-cash result from a Judgment.

10. The method of claim 4, wherein the defining the set of at least one automated analytical test, comprises defining at least one of the following analytical tests:

how has quality of a balance sheet asset changed since a previous financial reporting period?

how has quality of a balance sheet liability changed since a previous financial reporting period?

how have cash based profit and loss results trended since a previous financial reporting period?

how does the value of the current non-cash result from the Judgment compare with internal stated limits for the organization?

how does the value of the current non-cash result from the Judgment compare with external required limits for the organization?

defining one or more tolerance thresholds for the non-cash result from the Judgment that correspond to any one or more of the following status;

the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement is associated with acceptable risk;

the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement is associated with higher than acceptable risk; and

the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement is associated with unacceptable risk.

11. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

following the providing to the user interface an indication of additional risk being taken by accepting the non-cash result from the Judgment,

receiving user input from a user, via the user interface; and

updating, based on the received user input, at least one of

a Judgment to be booked to at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization;

at least one of the defined control steps;

at least one metric that indicates what is an expected non-cash result of calculating the Judgment; and

the defined set of at least one automated analytical test.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

following the updating, and based thereon, providing to the user interface an indication of additional risk being taken by accepting the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement.

13. A method, with an information processing system, for determining an amount of unidentified non-cash balance associated with a line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization, the method comprising:

calculating, with a processor, a non-cash balance for each of at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization, by;

subtracting a total cash balance associated with the each one of the at least one line item from a total balance associated with the each one of the at least one line item; and

calculating, with a processor, for each of the at least one line item, a known non-cash result from an aggregate of known non-cash valuations, accruals, and estimates, for a financial reporting period, and that are used to add to, or subtract from, cash basis revenues and expenses to be booked to the each of the at least one line item, respectively;

subtracting, for each of the at least one line item, a respective calculated known non-cash result from the respective non-cash balance associated with the each one of the at least one line item and thereby providing a respective unidentified non-cash balance associated with the each one of the at least one line item; and

providing, with a processor, to a user interface for each of the at least one line item, a value representing the respective unidentified non-cash balance associated with the each one of the at least one line item.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the calculating a non-cash balance comprises:

for each of the at least one line item;

reverse tracing, with a processor, each line item in an external financial reporting statement to one or more internal financial systems data of the organization, each of the one or more internal financial systems data comprising at least one account;

segmenting, with a processor, each account in the one or more internal financial systems data by internal transaction codes of the organization that identify those accounts associated with cash receipts and those accounts associated with cash disbursements;

aggregating, with a processor, in a total cash receipts balance, all account balances that are identified as cash receipts of those accounts that are associated with the each line item in an external financial reporting statement by the reverse tracing;

aggregating, with a processor, in a total cash disbursements balance, all account balances that are identified as cash disbursements of those accounts that are associated with the each line item in the external financial reporting statement by the reverse tracing;

calculating, with a processor, a net cash balance associated with the each line item based on the aggregated total cash disbursements balance and the aggregated total cash receipts balance; and

calculating, with a processor, a non-cash balance associated with the each line item based on the net cash balance associated with the each line item and a total balance associated with the each line item.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the providing to a user interface comprises displaying on at least one display screen, for each of the at least one line item, the value representing the respective unidentified non-cash balance associated with the each one of the at least one line item.

16. A method, with an information processing system, of defining a set of control steps used in calculating an aggregate of known non-cash valuations, accruals, and estimates that have a non-cash impact on each of at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization, the method comprising:

storing in memory, with a processor, a set of control process steps that ensure that

significant guesses made in, and that have substantial impact on, calculation of a Judgment, a Judgment comprising a non-cash result from an aggregate of known non-cash valuations, accruals, and estimates, for a financial reporting period, to be booked to at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization, are visible to management personnel of an organization, and

there is integrity in the calculation and assumptions used in calculating the Judgment;

for each Judgment;

presenting, with a processor, to a user interface, at least one control process step of the set of control process steps associated with a calculation of the respective Judgment;

receiving, from the user interface, first user input that indicates whether the presented at least one control process step is acceptable to a user as meeting business needs of the organization; and

in response to receiving the first user input that indicates the presented at least one control process step is unacceptable, prompting a user, via the user interface, to enter second user input that at least one of updates, amends, and changes, the presented at least one control process step that is unacceptable to the user.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

for each Judgment;

identify, with a processor, one or more sources of information that are used in at least one of the Judgment and a calculation of the non-cash result from the Judgment to be booked to at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement;

identify, with a processor, significant guesses made in, and that have substantial impact on the non-cash result from, the Judgment;

define, with a processor, one or more control process steps and store them in the memory, the one or more control process steps ensure that

the significant guesses are visible to management personnel of the organization, and

there is integrity in calculations and assumptions used in calculating the Judgment;

define, with a processor, one or more metrics and store them in the memory, the one or more metrics indicating what is an expected non-cash result of calculating the Judgment;

define, with a processor, a set of at least one automated analytical test and store it in the memory, the at least one automated analytical test supports the validity of each element of the calculation of the non-cash result from the Judgment;

calculate, with a processor, one conclusion analytic that

defines what is the non-cash result from the calculation of the Judgment; and

combines all of the at least one automated analytical test and, based on the combination, provides a risk assessment value that indicates what additional risk is being taken by accepting the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement; and

provide, with a processor, to a user interface an indication of additional risk being taken by accepting the non-cash result from the Judgment when booked to the at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the providing to the user interface comprises displaying on at least one display screen the indication of additional risk.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the displaying comprises displaying on the at least one display screen the indication of additional risk in association with a value of the respective line item of the at least one line item.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the indication of additional risk comprises a colored light that indicates acceptable risk by a green light, more than acceptable risk by a yellow light, and unacceptable risk by a red light.

21. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

re-defining, with a processor, a set of at least one automated analytical test and storing it in the memory, based on receiving the second user input, via a user interface, that at least one of updates, amends, and changes, the presented at least one control process step that is unacceptable to the user.

22. A computer readable storage medium storing a data structure for use with an information processing system for calculating judgments used to add to or subtract from cash basis revenues and expenses, booked to at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization, the computer readable medium comprising:

a data structure comprising;

a first set of identifiers each identifier representing a Judgment, a Judgment comprising an aggregation of at least one non-cash valuation, accrual, and estimate, for a financial reporting period, and that is calculated to add to or subtract from cash basis revenues and expenses, to be booked to at least one line item in an external financial reporting statement of an organization; and

a set of non-cash results, each non-cash result being a result of calculating a respective Judgment from a set of Judgments, and wherein each of the set of non-cash results being associated with a respective each one of the first set of identifiers representing each one of the respective set of Judgments, and wherein the information in the data structure is maintained by the information processing system for providing to a user interface the set of non-cash results and a second set of identifiers representing the respective set of Judgments, each of the set of non-cash results being associated with a respective each one of the second set of identifiers.

23. The computer readable storage medium of claim 22, wherein the data structure further comprising:

a third set of identifiers, each identifier representing at least one external financial reporting statement of the organization, and wherein each of the third set of identifiers being associated with a respective one of the first set of identifiers representing one of the respective set of Judgments, and wherein the information in the data structure is maintained by the information processing system for providing to a user interface the set of non-cash results and the second set of identifiers representing the respective set of Judgments and further a fourth set of identifiers representing at least one external financial reporting statement of the organization, each of the set of non-cash results being associated with a respective each one of the second set of identifiers and with each one of the fourth set of identifiers representing at least one external financial reporting statement of the organization.