Accounting Task

An Accounting Task is an operational management task of an economic entity's information about economic events.

• Context:
  • It can (typically) be performed by an Accounting Practitioner (possibly using an accounting information system).
  • It can be composed of identification, organization, classification, recording, summarization and communication of Information about Economic Events.
  • It can range from being a Personal Accounting Task to being an Organizational Accounting Task (such as governmental accounting, and for-profit accounting).
• Example(s):
  • a Financial Accounting Task.
  • a Tax Accounting Task.
  • a Financial Reporting Task.
  • a Closing the Books Task.
  • …
• Counter-Example(s):
  • an Auditing Task.
  • a Budgeting Task.
  • Legal Task.
• See: International Financial Reporting Standards, Investor, Creditor, Management, Regulatory Agency, Financial Accounting, Management Accounting, Auditing.

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References

2015

• (Wikipedia, 2015) ⇒ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/accounting Retrieved:2015-11-7.
  • Accounting or accountancy is the measurement, processing and communication of financial information about economic entities. The modern field was established by the Italian mathematician Luca Pacioli, in 1494. Accounting, which has been called the "language of business", measures the results of an organization's economic activities and conveys this information to a variety of users including investors, creditors, management, and regulators. Practitioners of accounting are known as accountants. The terms accounting and financial reporting are often used as synonyms. Accounting can be divided into several fields including financial accounting, management accounting, auditing, and tax accounting.Accounting information systems are designed to support accounting functions and related activities. Financial accounting focuses on the reporting of an organization's financial information, including the preparation of financial statements, to external users of the information, such as investors, regulators and suppliers; and management accounting focuses on the measurement, analysis and reporting of information for internal use by management. The recording of financial transactions, so that summaries of the financials may be presented in financial reports, is known as bookkeeping, of which double-entry bookkeeping is the most common system. Accounting is facilitated by accounting organizations such as standard-setters, accounting firms and professional bodies. Financial statements are usually audited by accounting firms, and are prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP). GAAP is set by various standard-setting organizations such as the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) in the United States and the Financial Reporting Council in the United Kingdom. As of 2012, "all major economies" have plans to converge towards or adopt the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).

2014

• http://www.open.edu/openlearn/money-management/financial-accounting-and-reporting/content-section--glossary
  • QUOTE: Accounting is a process which identifies, organises, classifies, records, summarises and communicates information about economic events, usually, but not exclusively, in monetary terms. Bookkeeping is often considered as being included within accounting, but accounting is a much wider concept than bookkeeping, as accounting may also be regarded as a transformative process as it turns the raw data recorded in the bookkeeping process into useful information.

2001

• (McQuaig & Bille, 2001) ⇒ Douglas J McQuaig, and Patricia A Bille. (2001). “College Accounting." Houghton Mifflin.
  • QUOTE: Accounting is the process of analyzing, classifying, recording, summarizing, and interpreting business transactions in financial or monetary terms. A business transaction is an event that has a direct effect on the operation of an economic unit, is expressed in terms of money, and is recorded. Examples of business transactions are buying or selling goods, renting a business, paying employees, and buying insurance.

    The primary purpose of accounting is to provide the financial information needed for the efficient operation of an economic unit. The term economic unit includes not only business enterprises but also not-for-profit entities, such as government bodies, churches...

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