Accounting is the compilation of financial information intended for use in making economic decisions. BOOKKEEPING provides basic accounting data, systematically recording daily financial information such as revenue from the sale of products or services; expenses related to business operations such as cost of goods sold; and overhead costs such as rent, salaries, etc. Accounting principles determine which financial events and transactions should be recorded in the accountant's ledgers, journals, and computer printouts. Analyzing and interpreting these records is the primary function of accounting. The various financial statements produced by accountants then provide businesses and other types of organizations with the basis for their financial planning and control, and provide other interested parties (investors, government) with information they can use to make decisions regarding these organizations. ACCOUNTING Accounting provides informative access to a company's financial position for three broad interest groups. First, it gives the company's management the information needed to evaluate financial performance over a past period and to make decisions regarding the future. Second, it informs the general public, and especially the company's shareholders or those interested in purchasing shares, about the company's financial situation during the previous quarter or year. Third, accounting provides reports to tax and regulatory departments at different levels of government. Accountants also perform many of the same functions for government agencies, nonprofit organizations, and other entities. Financial Accounting Large companies maintain their own internal accounting departments; small businesses can use the services of an external accountant. In both cases, the main task of the accountant is to gather figures relating to financial matters such as profits, losses, costs, tax debts and other liabilities, and present them to the management of the company under a logical and easily understandable form. . For publicly traded companies - those that offer stocks and bonds for sale to the public - accountants also prepare regularly published reports of interest to people outside the organization who are concerned about the company's financial condition: current and potential investors, creditors and the general public. In the middle of the document, the profession - in particular the big six companies - has initiated a number of liability suits. The audit industry is largely responsible for disciplining itself to ensure the independence of its auditors; and where an auditor differs from management on appropriate reporting principles, the auditor will require compliance with generally accepted accounting principles. The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) has developed performance standards for auditors designed to ensure both independence and the performance of adequate audit work. When financial statements are given a “clean opinion” but later prove to be misleading, the independence of the auditor may be called into question. Although the auditor's task is not specifically to discover fraud, courts have found auditors liable when their audit work was insufficient or lacked an adequate level of independence. William J. Oliver Bibliography: Blensly , (1989).