GnuCash and Swedish accounting legislation

[Mark Phillips]

Draug,

I don't know from your messages if you are an accountant or not, so please
excuse some of my questions if you are. Some things to think about as you
wrestle with this rather strange requirement, and search for a solution.

In the US, there are thousands of IRS regulations, and I have found that
accountants don't always follow every single one to the letter of the
regulation. The basic rule is the IRS wants the taxes to be paid in full
each year by someone, as as long as they are, then most of the other issues
just go away. The IRS gets upset when the taxes are not paid, and then they
may have many more regulations that you may or may not have broken to
charge you with. (I realize this may not be a tax related issue, but I am
not conversant enough with Swedish laws to create a better analogy).

1. What software are Swedish accountants using to meet this requirement?
What do they say about this rule? Do any of them worry about it, or do they
ignore it?

2. What software is recommended by the Swedish Account Standards Board that
meets this requirement?

3. Is there a way for you to work with an "approved" accounting package to
see how this requirement is implemented? A couple of screen shots from this
software would be very helpful when writing your feature request.

I believe that you will find there is a popup window that says "You can't
edit the transaction" and that is it. I am pretty sure there are no
safeguards inside the software that prevents editing transactions directly
in the data file.

4. Is there a process for software to be tested by the Swedish Account
Standards Board and then approved by them as being compliant?

5. How and when is this rule enforced? Is it only enforced if you are
accused of another accounting crime, or do you have to submit to some form
of government audit each year to show compliance?

If the former, then you only need to worry about it if you commit a crime.
At that point, what does it matter if there is one more charge against you,
more or less? ;) If the latter, then how do all the individuals who use
Excel to keep a set of books, or pen and paper for that matter, meet the
requirement each year?

6. When was this rule first mandated by the Swedish Account Standards Board?

Mark