Financial management

Financial management

We have extensive in-depth knowledge of the European Institutions’ budget implementation processes. We offer expertise, drawn from our own offices as well as other member firms’ within Deloitte’s extensive network, to provide a rich portfolio of budgeting and finance related services tailored to the European Institutions’ specific needs.

Finance transformation strategy
We help European Institutions devise a finance transformation strategy - empowering them to manage complex situations by visualising and shaping the future state of their finance function. Given increased expectations of the finance function in many organisations, not least European Institutions, finance leaders need to adapt in order to meet a new set of exigent requirements. They need to break down traditional barriers between departments in order to improve internal control, efficiency, performance measurement and strategy  definition and they need to do so in a way that is only “disruptive” in the most positive sense. Deloitte has an extensive range of expertise and experience to help Institutions’ finance functions achieve these objectives.

Review, assess and document finance processes
We help European Institutions identify the possible risk of non-compliance, suggest appropriate recommendations for improvement to the Institution’s management and create manuals to describe the business finance processes for each type of procedure. The scope of the “Review and assessment of the ABAC system and related circuits” is an audit that reviews the Agency’s financial information system; particularly the procedures associated with the registration of financial data using the ABAC system (ABAC Workflow, ABAC Accounting, ABAC Contracts and ABAC Assets).

Quality carry-over/carry-forward (accruals)
We help European Institutions develop a methodology to minimise the risk in the carry-forward procedure (one carryforward sheet per type of project, etc.).For each commitment being carried-forward, the accrual element must be established (delivered in 2013 or 2014, etc.). This work is complex since commitments could cover service contracts, projects, assets, etc. ECA usually has an easy task when pointing out weaknesses in the carry-forward procedure. Deloitte is ideally place to help European Institutions avoid these common pitfalls.

Activity-based management and budgeting (incl. zero-based budgeting)
We help European Institutions to further develop their activity-based management approach. This results in a better alignment of activities with fixed priorities, a better understanding of the use of human and financial resources, as well as a better monitoring and reporting of activities’ outcomes and their impact on EU citizens. This service offering also includes the implementation of zero-based budgeting processes, in which activities and related funding levels are budgeted from scratch each year, i.e. without reference to historical amounts.

Performance management and reporting
We help European Institutions better assess, report and ultimately strengthen its performance, by means of an EU-adapted performance management framework which translates the organisation’s mission into specific objectives and measures. We can then support in building a dashboard solution to monitor and report performance against the set targets.

Finance shared services and benchmarking
We help European Institutions to achieve maximum efficiency, control, and value from their administrative operations through optimising and/or consolidating redundant processes, systems, and organisations in a service-oriented unit. We do this by means of our integrated shared services solution offering. With the finance benchmark service offering, Deloitte helps organisations, through a customised framework, to assess the current state of their finance organisation, processes, and systems through workload measurement, benchmarking and best practice comparison.

IPSAS expertise and disclosure management
We assist European Institutions in the development and documentation of IPSAS compliant solutions in ways that are practicable to implement in such complex environments. Our service offering draws on the deep IPSAS expertise of Deloitte’s practitioners, combined with our thorough knowledge of the EU accounting environment (ABAC).

Forensic services
We help European Institutions investigate possible cases of fraud by undertaking forensic investigations on behalf of various Commission services and EU Delegations worldwide. These investigations may be part of a broader (financial) audit engagement and are usually requested by these contracting authorities when they have a suspicion of wrong-doing. These investigations are more particularly conducted in connection with projects financed under the European Development Fund.

Financial regulation policy and research
We help European Institutions address the challenges related to the application and interpretation of the constantly evolving EU financial regulations. This is done with the aim of improving the transparency of the expenditure of community funds, sound financial management, simplification, governance and accountability. Deloitte delivers studies using proven impact assessment methodologies, evaluation methods, and methodological tools for data collection, resulting in sound legal analysis and tailored recommendations.

Outsourcing of financial resources
We assist European Institutions with reconciliation issues, preparations for external audits, stabilising certain organisations with the right competencies and operational assistance in finance projects. Deloitte Financial Resources and Outsourcing has an extensive pool of experienced and technically well-trained accountants, treasurers, controllers and collectors with IPSAS knowledge. The professionals are trained to be involved in the business and identify opportunities for efficiencies. They are experienced in different ERP systems and share ideas and knowledge which result in the best case solutions.