12-1 Financial reporting: General information
Introduction
A condition of funding is that services report annually to both the Ministry and community (parents, staff and whānau) on how the Ministry’s funding has been spent. Services should report on each category of funding received from the Ministry.
Services may choose how they report to their community on the spending of this funding. This can be done by detailing the information in a newsletter, a notice displayed at the service or by publishing their annual financial reports.
This information must be available at the service within 180 days of the end of the financial year.
Financial reports required by the Ministry
All services that have been in operation for a full financial year must provide the Ministry with copies of their audited financial reports. Community-based and private services have different reporting requirements. The types of financial reports required is outlined in Section 12-2: Types of financial reports.
Services that have not completed a full financial year of operation do not have to provide audited financial reports.
When to send your financial report
Services have until 30 June each year to send the Ministry their audited financial reports for the previous financial year.
The following table shows an example of financial years and when the information should be sent in.
| If your financial year was... |
You will need to send your financial information to the Ministry by |
| 1 April 2008 - 31 March 2009 |
June 2010 |
| 1 July 2008 - 31 June 2009 |
June 2010 |
| 1 October 2008 - 31 September 2009 |
June 2010 |
| 1 January 2009 - 31 December 2009 |
June 2010 |
| 1 April 2009 - 31 March 2010 |
June 2011 |
Warning
Your service may have their advance funding withheld if:
- it misses the reporting deadline
- financial reports are not audited or do not meet the audit requirements. Refer to Section 12-4.
- audited financial reports do not meet the Ministry’s reporting requirements (e.g. equity funding has not been reported separately). Refer to Section 12-2.
Change in requirements from 1 January 2011
An income threshold for financial reporting is being introduced from 1 January 2011.
For the purposes of the income threshold, ‘income’ is all funding received from the Ministry of Education (inclusive of GST).
Services with an income of less than $80,000 will not have to provide audited financial reports. Services with an income of more than $80,000 will still have to provide audited financial reports.
The income threshold does not come into effect until 1 January 2011. All services, regardless of income, are required to submit audited financial reports for the financial year ending in 2009.