HRMC UK iXBRL Snagging List! (Unofficial Exceptions and Work-arounds)
It has come to my notice that there are one or two issues with iXBRL tagging that clients and customers have experienced, but that there is not yet an iXBRL snagging list on the HMRC WebSite.
I thought that I’d help out by putting a couple of snags here, and letting other practitioners add to the list for general community assistance
– Update –
I’ve had quite a few email responses to this already, so am going to update the below to also include some process issues as well as snags, plus some questions in case other individuals know the answers to these already.
Snag #001 – Dates – posted 5th July
Currently there is a `feature` in the HMRC validation routines for submitted iXBRL Accounts which fails to validate a Date where the month is in CAPITALS. So 31 December 2010 is a valid date when submitting to HMRC, but 31 DECEMBER 2010 will cause your Accounts and hence your Tax Filing to be rejected.
If you have signed off accounts with dates in a capitalised formet, you will need to over-ride them by creating a manual/hidden tag instead with a date in a format the HMRC systems can cope with.
Snag #002 – Subsidiary Companies – posted 5th July
Currently there is an issue on Accounts where a generic dimension memeber is used in some situations (technically where it is related to both a primary item and a hypercube & where the generic dimension also appears in a secondary dimension). This manifests currently in the IFRS Related Parties note and also the UK-GAAP Consolidation notes. The only work-around for this is to not tag the information.
Both these are known issues that HMRC should be dealing with, but currently there is no communications and no advised resolution date. My informal expectation is that it may get resolved in Q4 2011, but as there is not even official HMRC acknowledgement of the issues to date, any fix timeline that even I’m speculating on must be treated as not probable.
Snag #003 – Branches – posted 6th July
What happens when you have branch data for an overseas corporate with a UK tax filing requirement? Originally the indications were that you provide the overseas XBRL for the group if it is on the `white list`, or else the branch accounts should be tagged in isolation. Currently though only US-GAAP is on the `white list` and most Branch Accounts do not include data required for mandatory tags; e.g. Director signing off the accounts. Possibly HMRC are now encouraging PDFs instead?…
Validations #001 – Accounts and Tax – posted 5th July
A big process delay appears when the cross-check of the accounts and tax data fails. This is usually due to minor variations in the spelling of the Company Name between the Tax Return and the Accounts, and also minor variations in the Companies House Registration Number (CoHo RegNo) which are usually caused by omission of leading zeros in one product but not the other. Also shown as Error 1606 on the ChRIS error report.
Questions #001 – Glossy Accounts – posted 5th July
How exact a representation is necessary when tagging the Parent Company elements of a set of glossy group accounts? Does HMRC just accept a cut down P&L and B/S?
Questions #002 – Comparative Data – posted 6th July
Do you have to tag the prior year / comparative values in the P&L or B/S? Revenue guidance at events seems to have moved between yes and no several times, along with a concession for year one to not tag the comparatives. We think the current positions is that they are optional but cannot find an authorative source.
Please do comment to add other items that you are experiencing or send me an email. I will update this page when HMRC provides their own official statements or other iXBRL community members provide their own response.
