Financial Statement

Total expenditure on capital and revenue services amounted to €87.0m (2000 €74.2m).Of this €38.1m (2000 €29.8m) was spent on revenue services and €48.9m (2000 €44.4) was spent on capital services. Both figures indicate a very high level of activity during the year and the €48.9m spent on capital services is an indication of the Council’s ongoing commitment to position Sligo and the North West region to have a good quality of physical, social and recreational infrastructure and a satisfactory range of ancillary services which both modern businesses and individuals require

Prompt Payments Act
The Council’s policy is to process payments in accordance with the provisions of the Act.

Capital Debt
At 31st December 2001 the Council’s capital debt was €39.7m. The net increase of €6.1m on the previous year relates mainly to housing €2.4m, office refurbishment and ”One Stop Shop“ development €3.6m. During the year some borrowers redeemed their loans to the value of €1.1m

New Financial Management Systems
Phase 1 of the new Financial Management System ‘Agresso‘ went live in Sligo County Council on April 1st 2001 with the Purchase to Pay Cycle. All expenditure committed is captured at the purchase order entry stage. Controls and approval procedures are vested in the system. Budget holders can readily inform themselves of charges against their jobs through the system with information available directly and instantly.

The participation of staff at all locations throughout the organisation resulted in the successful operation and implementation of the system. 2001 has also seen the introduction and integration of the new concept of accrual accounting in a move away from cash accounting. The full potential of the new system will be maximised in future years.

The new cash receipting module within Agresso was introduced on 1st October 2001. All income is recorded at receipting stage. This system will facilitate the production of the Annual Financial Statements, moving away from the manual integration of the Income and expenditure systems. There was no fundamental change to the existing format of the AFS for 2001, but there were some changes arising from the changeover to accrual accounting and the introduction of a limited form of asset accounting.

The Agresso database introduced in April 2001 was euro compliant, facilitating our euro changeover plans with some operational end of year conversions. Phase 2 of the New Financial Management System – the replacement of existing billing systems covering rents, rates, water charges, service charges and loans will commence in October 2002.