The Hindu Business Line : When two people count there could be three numbers

"HERE is an important announcement relating to continuing professional education (CPE) credit," screams a line from `what's new' in www.icai.org. As only accountants can empathise, there is suddenly a problem of reconciliation.

Historically, in the beginning, when there were no numbers, there were no problems. But when counting began, thousands of years ago, differences arose, especially when more than one person was involved. That's why an ancient panacea for insomnia is to count the sheep jumping over the fence. With bigger numbers, error margin is also huge, as in the case of news reports of size of crowds that came to attend an election rally.

Just as more than half your time is spent in searching for some missing paper or file, accountants too spend a bulk of their work life in balancing things, left and right, debits and credits, passbook and cashbook, branch and head-office, and so forth. Thus, it is not unusual when the headquarters of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI) reports of having a problem of this nature.

"Members might have received letters from the decentralised offices of the Institute along with entry on record containing, inter alia, the CPE credit for the calendar year 2003," states the announcement. And that refers to the methodical communication that comes every year to each CA giving particulars of what all data the ICAI has about him/her. The idea is to get the CA see the printout, that is prepared as a great ritual and mailed at a good expense, and note the discrepancies, and inform the Institute.

An alternative, in the form of having the member look at his data on the Web, is in the works and when that takes over, one can see a substantial reduction in the postage expenses of the Institute.

Let's revert to the announcement to study about what, how and why of the problem. "Members may note that the data relating to CPE credit was provided by the CPE Directorate of the Institute to the decentralised offices for incorporating the same in the entry on record. Such data was consolidated based on the CPE credit data provided by committees of the Institute, regional councils, branches of the regional councils." That should tell you about the tortuous route that CPE data takes, criss-crossing the country.

Not all people are equally fast so "some of the CPE Programme Organising Units (POUs) are still sending in their data." As a result, "It is possible that some members may find some difference between their own records of CPE credits and that given in the entry on record."

Thus, all hell broke loose when Sharmaji's own record showed eight hours, but ICAI printed two hours, and already his spouse is angry where he spent those six hours, without understanding the problem has its roots in POUs. Similarly, Patel saheb finds 10 hours printed in the Institute communication, whereas he has not attended any programme; there are so many Patels, you see, and the computer in IP Marg must have got mixed up, as happens occasionally, they say when processing exam results.

What happens if all the one-lakh-plus CAs angrily retort? That's why Dr Chakravarty, CPE Director, has decided to do away with the feedback on this matter. "To avoid inconveniences that may be faced by the members in this respect it has been decided that the members need not submit the proofs for validating their records relating to CPE credit."

Then, how will they correct the numbers? "The Institute will be undertaking a separate exercise to ascertain the relevant details from POUs and on that basis separately get in touch with the members who have earned required CPE credit." A valid fear would be about fresh data flowing in along with old data, in which case Chakravarty may have to split his reconciliation wing year-wise, to handle the continuing inconvenience.

AccountSpeak@thehindu.co.in

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