A2000 - Singapore Accounting Software

A21 Financials Business Accounting Software - Accounts Receivables, Financial Accounting, Accounts Payables, General Ledger, Inventory, Multiple Currency, Warehouse Management, Packing List, Point of Sales, Stock Management, Inventory Tracking, Inventory Accounting, Cost of Goods, Fixed Assets, E-commerce Accounting. A21 - accounting software developed in Singapore - Singapore most popular accounting software

A2000 provides busness solutions in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Philippines - Financial Accounting Software

How Does A21 Accounting Handle the GST Rate Change from 1-July 2007?
(This FAQ pertains to Singapore companies only)

A21 Accounting (comprising SmartLedger, A21 SME Edition, Evo-Financials and Enterprise-SQL editions) handles GST rate change easily and transparently for users without the need to change the program. All our GST rates are table-driven and you may store and/or modify as many rates as required. However, please read this FAQ in detail regarding the handling of this change. We do not envisage any problem in the software but in the area of document printing, many users may possibly be impacted.

1. You Will Need To Maintain 2 Standard-rated Rates

GST rate change involved "transition", where there is a period of time when you need to maintain 2 rates of Standard-rated Supplies (say 5% and 7%) concurrently. If you are issuing a credit note (after 1-July-2007) for an invoice (dated 30-June-2007 and before), then this credit note must be accompanied with a 5% although the prevailing rate is 7%. Therefore you must have 2 different rates (5% and 7%) at any point in time during this transition phase.

2. Appending a New GST Rate

To change or append the 7% rate, go to System - Mandatory Setting - GST Rates. Append a new rate that is "G7" to represent the new 7% rate. Let the existing one stay as "G" as you will need to continue with the 5% transitional rate.

From 1-July-2007, use the new "G7" for Standard-rated Supplies in all your transactions. Should you need to raise a Credit Note (for reversal of transactions before 1-July-2007), you must use the "G" rate to apply to that.

3. Note to all A21 Accounting users

You must ensure the following are performed by/before 1-July-2007:

System Defaults - In Systems - System Defaults, please change the default GST to type "G7" so that new transactions can default to this rate.

Customer & Supplier Masters - change the default master rates for these to "G7" or else the transactions will pick up the defaulted old (5%) rate.

Crystal Reports for Document Printing - for documents like Sales Invoices, Purchase Orders, Credit Notes etc, please create the "G7" rate and perform a trial transaction entry to ensure the "GST - 7%" label is printed properly (when G7 is selected) in these documents. Certain Crystal Report documents may have the GST rate defaulted to type="G" and this will present a problem by printing the label "Add GST 5%" even though "G7" was selected in the transaction. In such cases, do not worry as your transactions are still saved correctly. Simply modify your Crystal Report RPT files accordingly to capture the appropriate GST rates.

For customers who need our assistance to modify Crystal reports, please do so before July-2007. As these are done by our contracted designers, a nominal charge will apply for any changes to existing Crystal Report formats. Due to expected rush by many companies, there may be a queue period. Contact our Tech Support Dept early by clicking HERE.

Common GST Questions

1. Can I do a direct change from 5% to 7% in type "G" instead of creating 2 different rates?

Of course you can do that; provided you do not need to deal with transitions in the example of a new company, newly registered for GST or first time usage of A21 Accounting. However, this is NOT the case for majority of GST registered companies.

Unless you fall in above categories, you must create 2 different rates (above guide) to handle the transitional period.

2. If I modify my June 2006 transactions, will the GST rate be saved as 7% instead of 5%?

No, if you used "G" for 5% supplies and "G7" for 7% supplies. The rates are stored at transaction level and the system remembers which transactions are "G" or "G7". You may edit without fear of wrongful rates being applied.

3. Will my GST Form 5 reflect correct standard rated supplies if I use G5 or G7 instead of "G"?

Yes, so long as your standard rated supplies are prefixed with a "G", it can be "G3", "G5", "G7" or even "G9", it is acceptable to our GST Form 5 report. Our GST Report is designed to handle transitions during GST rate changes.

4. Why is modification of Crystal Reports chargeable? Isn't this part of A21 Maintenance Service?

Generally under A21 Maintenance Service, our Tech Support department handles support issues only. Design of Crystal Reports has never been a scope for tech support/maintenance as such designing service can be complex or straight-forward; this spectrum can mean a resource utilization of between 1 hour to 6 hours per report job.

For this 2007 GST rate hike exercise, we had contracted out the design services to business partners who can handle such a service. Having more than 3,000 companies running A21 Accounting in Singapore, and with each company having average of 7 to 10 Crystal reports, it is impossible for us to handle this service (potentially 30,000 RPT files) on our own.

For this period, we had worked out for you a very special contracted price of S$50/- for each existing Crystal Report that need modification. Contact our Tech Dept HERE.

5. Are there any assistance scheme by the Government for this GST rate hike exercise?

If you are already a GST registered company, or if it is mandatory to be GST-registered (i.e. above $1M in sales) there isn't any assistance for now. However if you are NOT registered (nor mandated to register because your sales is less than $1M); and want to do so voluntarily, then the GST Assistance Scheme is available for you. Check it out HERE.

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