This document establishes common definitions of accounting data elements and provides the information necessary to extract relevant audit data.

NOTE For the purpose of this document, "audit" refers to an examination of an entity's financial and financial related records in order to check that they are fairly presented.

This document is applicable to the bridging of understanding among auditors, auditees, software developers and IT professionals, and creating a mechanism for expressing the information, common to accounting, in a manner independent of accounting and ERP systems. This document serves as a foundation for local data extraction efforts in the areas of general ledger, accounts receivable, sales, accounts payable, purchase, inventory, and property, plant and equipment.