How to Set Up Parallel Asset Accounting in SAP S/4HANA Finance with Differing Fiscal Year Variants
by Ajay Maheshwari,
SAP FI/CO and SAP S/4HANA Solution Architect
Kavita Agarwal,
SAP FI/CO and SAP S/4HANA Solution Architect
February 02, 2017
Learning Objectives
Reading this article, you will learn:
How the real-time integration between General Ledger Accounting (FI-GL) and Asset Accounting (FI-AA) in SAP S/4HANA forces a different kind of setup for the ledgers
SAP S/4HANA Finance offers an integrated and unified data model in Finance between the SAP General Ledger Accounting (FI-GL) and Asset Accounting (FI-AA). It offers many benefits to users, especially the real-time reconciled ledgers (the main ledger and asset sub-ledger).
However, the new features of SAP S/4HANA Finance also significantly change how the new FI-AA module must be set up in a parallel reporting scenario (for example, local reporting and group reporting, where the local company and parent companies follow different reporting periods).
Consider a scenario that represents a practical real-life scenario for many organizations. ABC Inc. USA follows International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) reporting standards and Jan-Dec as the fiscal reporting period. It has a subsidiary company in India (represented by company code 9999 in our example) that has to follow Apr-Mar as the fiscal reporting period to comply with local laws. As such, company code 9999 follows parallel accounting in SAP S/4HANA Finance, using a ledger approach.
Setting Up the Scenario in Classic FI-AA as of ECC 6.0
To set up the above scenario in classic FI-AA as of SAP ERP Central Component (ECC) 6.0, you would do the following customizing in your SAP system, as shown in Table 1.
| Company code | Ledger | Fiscal year | Depreciation area |
|---|---|---|---|
| 9999 | 0L | V3 (Apr-Mar) | 01 |
| 9999 | 2L | K4 (Jan-Dec) | 02 |
Table 1: The customizing setup in classic FI-AA as of ECC 6.0
In our scenario, you would assign the leading ledger (0L) and a non-leading ledger (2L), with fiscal year variants as V3 and K4, respectively, to the company code 9999. (The steps for this configuration in ECC are not part of the scope of this article). Using the ledger 0L, company code 9999 would be reporting as per local laws (i.e., Apr-Mar) and with the ledger 2L, it would report as per the group reporting norms (i.e., Jan-Dec).
The leading ledger 0L is assigned to the Depreciation Area 01 and the non-leading ledger 2L is assigned to the Depreciation Area 02. However, you don’t have to assign a fiscal year variant specifically to the depreciation areas, as the asset accounting derives the fiscal year variant from the leading ledger. It must be noted that the fiscal year start and end date must be same for all depreciation areas in asset accounting.