CHAPTER 2

The accounting officer of each institution and body referred to in Article 141 of the Financial Regulation shall draw up and keep updated documents describing the organisation of the accounts and accounting procedures of his institution and body. Budget revenue and expenditure shall be recorded in the computerised system referred to in Article 236, according to the economic nature of the operation, as current revenue or expenditure or as capital. The accounts shall be kept with the help of an integrated computerised system. Where accounts are kept using computerised systems and subsystems, such systems and subsystems shall be described in full. That description shall define the content of all data fields and specify how the system treats individual operations. It shall state how the system guarantees the existence of a complete audit trail for each operation and for any change made to the computerised systems and subsystems so that it is possible at any time to identify the nature of the change and the person who made it. The description of computerised accounting systems and subsystems shall indicate any links between those systems and the central accounting system, particularly as regards the transfer of data and the reconciliation of balances. Access to the computerised systems and subsystems shall be confined to persons included on a list of authorised users which is kept and updated by each institution. Each institution and each body referred to in Article 141 of the Financial Regulation shall keep a journal, a general ledger and at least sub-ledgers for debtors, creditors and fixed assets, unless it is not justified by cost-benefit considerations. The accounting ledgers shall consist of electronic documents which are identified by the accounting officer and offer full guarantees for use as evidence. Entries in the journal shall be transferred to the general ledger, itemised according to the chart of accounts referred to in Article 212. The journal and the general ledger may be split into as many special journals and special ledgers are necessary to meet requirements. Entries recorded in special journals and special ledgers shall be centralised at least every month in the journal and in the general ledger. Each institution and body referred to in Article 141 of the Financial Regulation shall establish a trial balance covering all the accounts of the general accounts, including the accounts cleared during the year, with, in each case: account number; description; total debits; total credits; balance. The data in the general ledger shall be kept and organised in such a way as to justify the content of each of the accounts included in the trial balance. As regards the inventory of fixed assets, the provisions of Articles 246 to 253 shall apply. Entries shall be made using the double entry method, whereby any movement or variation recorded in the accounts shall be represented by an entry establishing an equivalence between the amount debited and the amount credited in the various accounts affected by that entry. The euro counterpart of a transaction denominated in a currency other than the euro shall be calculated and entered in the accounts. Transactions in foreign currencies in accounts which can be revalued shall be revalued at least each time the accounts are closed. That revaluation shall be based on the rates laid down in accordance with Article 6. The rate to be used for conversion between the euro and another currency to draw up the balance sheet at 31 December of year N shall be that of the last working day of year N. The Union accounting rules adopted under Article 152 of the Financial Regulation shall specify the conversion and re-evaluation rules to be provided for the purposes of accrual accounting. All accounting records shall specify the origin, content and booking reference of each data item and the references of the relevant supporting documents. Accounting operations shall be recorded in the journal by one of the following methods, which are not mutually exclusive: day by day, operation by operation; in the form of a monthly summary of the total amounts involved in operations, provided that all documents allowing verification of individual operations day by day are kept. Entries in the journal and in sub-ledgers shall be made final by means of a validation procedure prohibiting any change to or deletion of the entry. A closure procedure designed to freeze the chronology of records and guarantee their inviolability shall be implemented at the latest before the final financial statements are presented. The balance of accounts in the trial balance shall be reconciled periodically and at least at the annual closure, with the data from the management systems used by authorising officers for the management of assets and liabilities and for the daily input into the accounting system. Periodically, and at least whenever the accounts are closed, the accounting officer shall check that the bank balances correspond to the actual situation, in particular as regards: cash at bank, by reconciliation of the statements of account from financial institutions; cash in cash offices, by reconciliation with the data in the cash book. The fixed assets accounts shall be reviewed in accordance with Article 250. The interinstitutional liaison accounts shall be reconciled monthly. The suspense accounts shall be opened and reviewed annually by the accounting officer. Those accounts shall be under the responsibility of the authorising officer and he shall clear them as soon as possible. The budget accounts shall show, for each subdivision of the budget: in the case of expenditure: the appropriations authorised in the initial budget, the appropriations entered in amending budgets, the appropriations carried over, the appropriations available following collection of assigned revenue, transfers of appropriations and the total appropriations thus available; the commitments and payments in respect of the financial year; in the case of revenue: the estimates entered in the initial budget, the estimates entered in amending budgets, assigned revenue and the total amount of estimates thus determined; the entitlements established and the amounts recovered in respect of the financial year in question; the commitments still to be paid and revenue still to be recovered carried forward from previous financial years. The commitment appropriations and payment appropriations referred to in point (a) of the first subparagraph shall be entered and shown separately. The global provisional commitments relating to the European Agricultural Guarantee Fund (hereinafter ‘EAGF’) and the corresponding payments shall also be recorded in the budget accounts. Those commitments shall be presented in respect of total EAGF appropriations. The budget accounts shall show separately: the use of appropriations carried over and the appropriations for the year; the clearance of outstanding commitments. On the revenue side, amounts still to be recovered from previous financial years shall be shown separately. The budget accounts may be organised in such a way as to develop a cost accounting system. The budget accounts shall be kept using computer systems, in books or on file cards.

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Source: EUR-Lex (Cellar) · retrieved 2026-11-04 · Text as adopted (Official Journal); later amendments are not incorporated in this text.