Exposure draft issued on proposed Omnibus SSARS.

• Position: Accounting & auditing news

The AICPA's Accounting and Review Services Committee has issued an exposure draft of a proposed Statement on Standards for Accounting and Review Services, Omnibus Statement on Standards for Accounting and Review Services--2008. Comments are due Dec. 28.

The proposed statement will accomplish the following:

* Revise AR section 100, Compilation and Review of Financial Statements; AR section 200, Reporting on Comparative Financial Statements; and AR section 300, Compilation Reports on Financial Statements Included #1 Certain Prescribed Forms, to confoma to the terminology utilized by other standard setters by replacing the term nonpublic entity with the term nonissuer. Generally, a nonpublic entity as currently defined in AR section 100.04 would be considered a nonissuer under the revised definition.

* Revise AR section 100 to clarify the objective of a compilation of financial statements as an engagement in which no assurance is provided. Furthermore, new sections entitled, "Objective of a Compilation Engagement" and "Objective of a Review Engagement," will be established to clearly indicate the differences between compilation, review and audit engagements. The clarified objectives of the respective engagements will be included in the illustrative engagement letter for a compilation of financial statements (Appendix C of AR section 100), the illustrative engagement letter for a compilation of financial statements not intended for third party use (Appendix D of AR section 100), and the illustrative engagement letter for review engagements (Appendix E of AR section 100). This amendment also revises DAR section 100.26 to state that, in a review engagement, the accountant must (1) apply analytical procedures to the financial statements; (2) make inquires of management and, when deemed appropriate, other company personnel; and (3) obtain representations from management for all financial statements and periods covered by the accountant's review report. AR section 100.31 is also revised to properly state the above requirement with respect to analytical procedures.

* Revise the definition of "third party" in AR section 100.04 to clarify that the phrase, "who are knowledgeable about the nature of the procedures applied and the basis of accounting and assumptions used in the preparation of financial statements," applies to "members of management," and also to...