Sage lies

Sage lies

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I have just received the following e-mail from Sage (sorry I don't know how to include the image, so it's just plain text):

[quote=Sage]I’m delighted to introduce you to Sage Accounts Production Advanced v14, which is available for new and existing customers from 06 November 2014.

For accountants in practice or industry, Sage Accounts Production Advanced v14 is currently the only UK accounts production software that offers compliance for the new FRS 102 standard with iXBRL for limited companies.

[/quote]

Compare this with the e-mail I received from IRIS 3 weeks ago on 14th October:

IRIS Accountancy Suite v11.6 available now!
The latest version of IRIS Accountancy Suite is now available to download.
 
This release ensures you and your practice are ready for the major overhaul of UK accounting standards ahead of the mandate.
 
The IRIS Compliance guarantee is second to none and now with the new UK GAAP FRS101 and 102 capability within IRIS Accounts Production you can create your re-stated comparative accounts and first year transitional adjustments for the introduction of the new financial reporting standards in plenty of time to get ahead of the oncoming legislative burden and ensure you are ready ahead of the competition.

How can Sage possibly claim to be the only UK accounts production software that is compliant with FRS102 when most IRIS users will have already installed the FRS102 compliant version?

Replies (4)

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By 3569787
03rd May 2016 16:20

Marketing

!

Thanks (1)
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By andy.partridge
06th Nov 2014 17:03

Hmmmm

This is the company that for decades has marketed its entry level software at unskilled operators in order to sell them expensive Helpdesk support and training products, allegedly. 

Thanks (1)
By ChrisStrong
18th Nov 2014 06:15

Sage Response: Internal pep talk leaked…
Disclaimer: I am the product manager for Sage accounts production range (UK and Ireland) and the words printed above are mine from a leaked internal pep talk yesterday.

We are the first to market with compliance for the FRS 102 standard which can produce iXBRL accounts for limited companies.  I acknowledge other providers claim to support the FRS 102 standard but none have delivered it with iXBRL tagging.

To add some context, we’re very proud of what our compliance and development team delivered and the excitement has obviously spilled over for you to have received the information too.

Let me share the basis for my claims:

From the release of the FRS 102 standard last year, a knowledgeable accountant could have adopted the standard by manually producing a set of accounts using MS Word and manually tagged the accounts using an iXBRL tagging tool with the IFRS taxonomy.  I do not consider this to be accounts production software.

Sage Accounts Production Advanced (SAPA) is designed as a high-end solution for accountants who want to produce highly customisable management and year-end accounts.  For this market, SAPA typically competes with other large software vendors and compared against these we were first to release compliance for FRS 102 standard with iXBRL tagging.  I agree that the other software you mentioned did release a few weeks before us but they didn’t include iXBRL tagging with their FRS 102 standard template.

We worked with the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) and have taken an active role in the development and delivery of the iXBRL taxonomies for the new FRS 102 standard.  Our position was to release the FRS 102 standard which enabled our customers to early adopt the standard.  For us this meant we must produce FRS 102 iXBRL accounts which will be accepted by the HMRC when included with a tax return.  This is what we have delivered.

For further information about Sage Accounts Production Advanced see https://sage-exchange.co.uk/products/sage-accounts-production-advanced.  Unfortunately the release information was leaked early.  We are planning on updating our content over the next few weeks to cover all the things we’ve included to help our customer transition from UK GAAP to FRS 102.

Kind regards

Chris Strong
Product Manager
Sage Accountants’ Division, UK & Ireland

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By Weald Accountant
18th Nov 2014 10:03

I think it is pretty clear that the statement says 'with iXBRL', where as what you show from IRIS doesn't say that their software offers this at the moment.

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