Annual financial statements, from the trial balance to the signed set
Bring in the client’s trial balance or general ledger, map it with the AI’s suggestions and your own rules, and build statements under IFRS for SMEs, full IFRS or GRAP — for one company, a group or a half-year — where every figure links to the accounts behind it. Review them with the client on a secure link, approve them at the Partner Gate and send each director their own signing link — every step recorded.
Achekam Financial Statements: Annual financial statements from the trial balance to the signed set: the client, the engagement, Financial Intake, the Studio, client review and the directors’ e-signatures in one workspace. For Firms that prepare financial statements.
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The problems it solves
- Statements rebuilt in Word and Excel every year. The Studio builds the statements, notes and policies from the mapped trial balance; next year rolls forward with the settings and your edited wording.
- A figure nobody can trace. Every figure is a live link to the trial-balance accounts behind it, with what was checked and what could not be.
- Mapping redone by hand for every client. The mapping engine asks only where it is unsure, most material first, with its suggestion and its reason — and remembers your answer for that client.
- Drafts e-mailed back and forth. The client reviews the draft on a secure link with no login, comments on the exact copy they were given, and approves it there.
- Signing chased on paper. Each director gets their own signing link; the signed copy and its completion certificate are filed in the client’s documents.
- Nobody can say who did what. Preparer, reviewer and partner are recorded per engagement; the server refuses a review by the person who prepared the work.
What it includes
Clients and engagements
- The full client record — Client 360: services, engagements, documents, contacts and the secretarial registers the directors are read from.
- Engagements by service — One engagement per year’s job; the engagement type sets the work programme, dates, fee and the people on it.
- Workstreams and work items — Each work item with its objective, instructions, procedures, completion requirements and dependencies.
- Who prepares, reviews and signs — Assignments with a reason; the database refuses one that would make anyone both the preparer and the reviewer.
Financial Intake
- Trial balance and ledger import — Excel, CSV, PDF and more; a general ledger is added up per account into a trial balance. Every file is stored and traceable to the original.
- Validation — Debits equal credits, no duplicate accounts, every line coded, balances on their usual side — checked before anything moves on.
- Mapping with questions, not guesses — The engine maps what it knows and asks about the rest, most material first, each question with its suggestion and reason.
- Versions and approval — A new trial balance is a new version; the old one is kept and marked superseded. A person approves it — never the AI.
The Financial Statements Studio
- Statements, notes and policies — Built from the approved trial balance for the framework: the four primary statements, the notes and the accounting policies.
- Figures you can trace — Every figure links to its accounts; lineage shows where each part of the document came from.
- Comparatives and roll-forward — Last year beside this year; next year’s statements start from this year’s settings and wording.
- AI statutory notes — The AI drafts the words of a note on the topic you choose; figures come from the trial balance, and the draft is checked before a person accepts it.
- Reports for the level of assurance — The compiler’s report (ISRS 4410) or the independent reviewer’s report, with the public interest score on the higher plans.
- Consolidated group statements — Subsidiaries added from their own statements; intercompany balances, trading, dividends and investments suggested for elimination and accepted by a person; goodwill and the non-controlling interest worked out (IFRS 10, IFRS for SMEs Section 9).
- Interim statements (IAS 34) — Condensed half-year or quarterly statements under full IFRS, against the comparable interim period, with the selected explanatory notes.
- GRAP for the public sector — Municipality and public-entity templates: revenue from exchange and non-exchange transactions, policies citing each Standard of GRAP, and the irregular, fruitless and wasteful, and unauthorised expenditure notes with their reconciliations.
Review, sign and issue
- Statement workflow — Preparer review, manager review, client review, finalisation, the partner, signing and issue — and the server refuses a review by the person who prepared them.
- Client review on a secure link — The client’s authorised contact reads, comments and approves the exact copy they were given.
- The Partner Gate — Open comments, failing checks and unedited AI drafts counted; the ISQM 1 quality gates checked by the server; the partner’s approval bound to the version’s content.
- Directors’ e-signatures — Each director signs on their own line from their own link; the signed copy is filed with its completion certificate.
- Requests for information — Ask the client for what is still missing through a secure request, tracked until it is answered.
- iXBRL — Tagging of the statements for CIPC filing, on the Professional and Firm plans.
How it works
- Add the client. Its profile, framework, year-end and directors: the statements are bound to it.
- Open the engagement. The engagement type sets the work; assign who prepares, reviews and signs.
- Bring in the trial balance. Import it or the general ledger, answer the mapping questions and approve it.
- Build, review and sign. Build the statements, share them with the client, approve at the Partner Gate and send to the directors.
Key capabilities
- Clients and engagements — The full client record, an engagement per year’s job, workstreams and work items, and who prepares, reviews and signs.
- Financial Intake — The trial balance or general ledger in, validated, mapped with questions and approved by a person.
- The Financial Statements Studio — Statements, notes and policies built from the approved trial balance, every figure traceable, AI notes drafted for a person to accept.
- Groups, interim and GRAP — Consolidated group statements, condensed interim statements under IAS 34 and native GRAP statements for the public sector, in the same Studio.
- Review, sign and issue — Preparer and manager review, the client’s review on a secure link, the Partner Gate and each director’s own e-signature.
The platform foundation
Financial Statements runs on the shared foundation: the same sign-in and two-factor authentication, roles that decide who prepares, reviews and signs, the document store with malware scanning, governed AI that only drafts for a person to approve, and every workspace held apart by row-level security in the database.
Plans
| Plan | For | Monthly | Annual | Trial | Includes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Statements Starter | Accounting and audit firms | R 999 a month | R 9 984 a year | 14-day free trial | 2 users, 20 GB storage. AI assistant; Automation centre; E-signing; Client requests; Client vault and shares; Financial statements |
| Statements Professional | Accounting and audit firms | R 1 999 a month | R 19 980 a year | 14-day free trial | 5 users, 50 GB storage. AI assistant; Automation centre; E-signing; Client requests; Client vault and shares; Financial statements |
| Statements Firm | Accounting and audit firms | R 3 999 a month | R 39 984 a year | 14-day free trial | 15 users, 50 GB storage. AI assistant; Automation centre; E-signing; Client requests; Client vault and shares; Financial statements |
Prices as published today; VAT and billing terms as shown when you sign up.
Questions
- Do we need to keep our clients’ books on Achekam?
- No. The statements are built from a trial balance or general ledger you bring in — from any accounting system, as Excel, CSV or PDF. If you later want to keep clients’ books on Achekam, add the Practice suite from your workspace.
- Which frameworks and reports does it cover?
- Statements under IFRS for SMEs, full IFRS (with IFRS 18 presentation of profit or loss) and the Standards of GRAP for municipalities and public entities, and own-policies statements where the law allows them. Under full IFRS and IFRS for SMEs a parent’s statements can be consolidated with its subsidiaries’; under full IFRS condensed interim statements are drafted under IAS 34. The compiler’s report (ISRS 4410), the independent reviewer’s report (ISRE 2400, or ISRE 2410 on interim statements) or, with an audit engagement, the place for the auditor’s report — chosen by the engagement.
- How is quality management (ISQM 1) handled?
- At the signature. Before a partner can sign, the server checks the ISQM 1 gates on the firm’s own records: client acceptance or continuance for the year, independence, the engagement quality review, open consultations, unresolved differences of opinion, critical quality incidents and professional judgements awaiting approval. An open gate stops the signature; only the engagement partner may sign past it, with a written reason that is recorded.
- What does group consolidation not do for us?
- It uses book values at the date control was obtained. Fair-value adjustments, unrealised profit on sales between members, goodwill impairment or amortisation, a mid-year acquisition’s results before control, and disposals are entered as consolidation journals, each with its reason. Sub-groups and members in another currency are not consolidated yet, and the statements show the group’s columns: the company’s own set is prepared as a second project.
- What does the AI do — and not do?
- It suggests account mappings with its confidence and reason, and drafts the wording of statutory notes. A person accepts every mapping and every draft; the AI’s wording is checked for opinion language and for figures that are not in the trial balance, a note with no mapped accounts is refused, and the Partner Gate counts the AI drafts nobody has edited.
- How does the client review the draft?
- Their authorised review contact gets a secure link — no login, it expires — to read the draft, comment and approve it. The statements cannot be signed while a comment is open, and the approval is recorded against the exact copy they were given.
- How do the directors sign?
- Each director gets their own link and signs on their own line, or prints and signs by hand. Signatures are simple electronic signatures under the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act; the signed copy and its completion certificate are filed in the client’s documents.
- What happens next year?
- Roll forward: the new year’s statements start from this year’s settings and edited wording, a new engagement is opened, and this year becomes the comparative.
