Employee benefits

For news from the AICPA and state societies, visit www.cpa2biz.com , which also offers online CPE, AICPA professional literature, practice management aids and links to state society Web sites. The Institute’s accounting standards staff releases two technical practice aids. One provides guidance on reporting financial highlights by separate accounts (

Several federal financial regulators jointly issue a guide to help consumers make informed decisions about choices they face as a result of the privacy provisions of the Graham-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999, which loosened restrictions on banks, insurers and other financial institutions’ sharing of marketing information about their customers. The guide,

The IRS should improve communications between its senior managers and field employees about its reorganization and customer service operations, the AICPA testified before the Internal Revenue Service Oversight Board in January. The Institute praised certain recent IRS initiatives, such as the large and midsize business division’s Fast Track dispute resolution

The secretary of the Treasury, the director of the Office of Management and Budget and the comptroller general of the United States restructured the Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board in January to increase the number of public members to six from three, decrease the number of federal government members to

SEC Chairman Harvey L. Pitt calls for the commission’s greater influence over FASB to ensure it addresses urgent topics and issues standards more swiftly than it has. He also says the commission will quickly establish a private-sector regulatory body—composed largely of individuals independent of the accounting profession—to replace the Public

Although there is no evidence banks are abusing “special purpose entities” to inappropriately move liabilities off their balance sheets, Mark W. Olson, a Federal Reserve Board governor, says the Fed is working with banking regulators to prevent such practices. According to Olson, when financial institutions retain substantive risks associated with

The Department of Labor’s Pension and Welfare Benefits Administration (PWBA) adds a series of questions and answers to its Web site to help employee-benefit-plan administrators comply with pension, health and disability claims regulations it published last year. The new rules establish shorter claims-processing time frames, additional disclosure requirements and new

AICPA Board Chairman James G. Castellano testified in February before the House Energy and Commerce Committee in support of accounting, auditing and financial reporting reforms. He called for a modernized financial reporting model, more frequent reporting, revised accounting rules for special purpose entities, a new auditing standard enabling auditors to

The GAO issues final standards on auditor independence ( www.gao.gov/special.pubs/agagas3.pdf ). They contain significant changes affecting audits of governments and non- and for-profit entities that participate in federal programs. Among the new rules’ provisions are restrictions on auditing firms’ ability to offer consulting services to their audit clients. The AICPA

Rating service Standard & Poor’s says the financial performance of personal insurers—which offer auto, health and similar coverage—continued a downward trend in 2001. Under earlier, more favorable market conditions, these insurers had amassed huge financial reserves and cut prices aggressively. However, since 1998, S&P says, managed care and other cost-reduction