Sber: implementation of IFRS 16 requirements
Project according to IFRS 16 requirements for a large financial environment: methodology, calculations, integration and reporting.
Shows work on a bank scale and requirements for accounting reliability.When does renting become a financial risk?
The lease looks simple only until the first large register of contracts. In reality, premises, land plots, warehouses, offices, equipment, transport, data centers, base stations, extensions, indexations, terminations, repair holidays, security payments and dozens of variant conditions converge in one environment.
The problem becomes managerial when the CFO, chief accountant, IFRS/RAS methodologist, property owner and IT team cannot quickly answer basic questions: what contracts are valid, what payments will fall in the next periods, where the rate has changed, why the calculation differs from the last month, what is included in the reporting and what adjustments are supported by documents.
At this point, rent accounting ceases to be a local accounting task. This is already part of the financial architecture: ERP, contract loop, treasury, BI/DWH, audit, access control, period closure and master data quality.
For which companies is this especially important?
Retail and FMCG
Shops, warehouses, offices, logistics, retail space, variable payments and massive changes in conditions across the network.
Telecom
Base stations, sites, technical premises, channels, regional agreements and a large number of objects with different deadlines.
Finance and Banking
Offices, branches, ATMs, data centers, strict reporting, internal control and the high cost of errors in disclosures.
Industry and mining and metallurgy
Production sites, equipment, land, real estate, SAP/ERP environments, asset accounting and coordination with management reporting.
Oil and gas and energy
Land plots, infrastructure, equipment, contracting contours, long-term contracts and the connection between rent and investment programs.
Holdings
Many legal entities, intragroup transactions, different accounting policies, consolidation, IFRS, RAS and management reporting.
Terms without fog
| Term | What does it mean in practice |
|---|---|
| IFRS | International Financial Reporting Standards, international financial reporting standards. In Russia, the Russian abbreviation IFRS is often used. |
| IFRS 16 Leases | International rental standard. For a lessee, it generally requires the recognition of a right-of-use asset and a lease liability under leases, with exceptions for short-lived and low-value items. |
| FSBU 25/2018 | Federal accounting standard “Accounting for leases”, approved by order of the Ministry of Finance of Russia No. 208n. Mandatory application began with financial statements for 2022, if the organization has not applied the standard before. |
| RAS | Russian accounting standards. In large companies, lease accounting often needs to be synchronized between RAS, IFRS and management reporting. |
| Use right asset | An asset that represents a company's right to use the leased asset during the term of the lease. |
| Lease obligation | The obligation to make future lease payments based on the lease term, payment schedule, and discount rate. |
| Discounting | Reducing future payments to present value. An error in rate or timing changes the obligation, costs and reporting. |
| Modification of the contract | Change of lease terms: term, area, object, payments, indexation, extension or termination. In accounting, this often requires recalculation of the schedule and obligation. |
| SAP RE-FX | SAP Flexible Real Estate Management module for managing real estate and rental relations. In migration projects, it is important to preserve RE-FX logic, data, and calculation history. |
| 1C:УХ | 1C: Holding management: the outline of budgeting, treasury, IFRS, consolidation and management reporting, which may include lease accounting. |
World and Russian practice
IFRS 16 was introduced to give financial statements users better visibility into lease liabilities, which previously often remained off balance sheet. In practice, this changed not only accounting entries, but also operational discipline: the contract must be classified in a timely manner, the term must be estimated, the rate must be determined, the schedule must be built, the changes must be tracked and the impact on reporting must be explained.
Russian FAS 25/2018 is built taking into account the logic of IFRS 16, but lives in the Russian environment: RAS, tax differences, accounting policies, audit, requirements for primary documents, period closure and integration with 1C/SAP. Therefore, copying an international model into ERP without a methodology is dangerous: the system will count, but the business will not be able to prove why this is so.
| Source | What do we take to work? |
|---|---|
| IFRS Foundation: IFRS 16 Leases | Purpose of the standard, lessee accounting model, right of use of the asset, lease liability, exceptions for short-term leases and low-value assets. |
| IFRS 16 Effects Analysis | The managerial meaning of the standard: increasing the visibility of lease commitments, impact on reporting, data and processes of companies. |
| FSBU 25/2018, order of the Ministry of Finance No. 208n | Russian accounting rules for lessees and lessors, disclosures, transitional provisions and application of the standard in financial statements. |
| Information message of the Ministry of Finance IS-accounting-15 | Context of implementation of FAS 25/2018 and connection with IFRS 16. |
What needs to be automated in practice
Register of contracts
A single contract card, rental object, counterparty, legal entity, term, conditions, documents, statuses and owners.
Payment schedules
Scheduled payments, advances, variable payments, VAT, indexation, currencies, holidays, security payments and changes in conditions.
IFRS 16 / FSBU 25 calculations
Right-of-use asset, lease liability, interest expense, depreciation, discounting and revaluations.
Modifications
Prolongation, termination, increase or decrease in area, change in rate, term or object of lease.
Closing the period
Postings, reconciliations, error control, discrepancies between the contract and calculation, explanations for accounting and the auditor.
Reporting and BI
Disclosures, management reports, DWH showcases, plan-facts, liability forecasts, reconciliations with treasury and budget.
Data migration
Transfer of contracts, objects, schedules, historical calculations, balances, parameters and checksums from SAP, Excel or legacy.
Access Control
Roles of accounting, methodologists, lawyers, facility owners, treasury, auditors and IT support.
How RESTART works
1
Diagnostics
We collect contract flows, systems, accounting policies, problem areas, volume of contracts, period closure, roles and reporting requirements.
2
Methodology
We fix classification rules, terms, rates, exceptions, modifications, disclosures, tax and management differences.
3
Architecture
We design the target environment: 1C, SAP, ERP, contractual system, EDI, DWH/BI, integrations, roles and control reports.
4
Implementation
We set up contract cards, schedules, calculations, postings, reports, exchanges, data quality checks and custom scripts.
5
Migration and reconciliations
We transfer data, build checksums, check calculations on test contracts, prepare UAT and correct discrepancies.
6
Launch and support
We support trial operation, first closure of the month, user training, documentation and further development of the environment.
Where RESTART is especially useful
RESTART's strength is the combination of financial methodology, SAP/1C/ERP experience, integrations, data and project management. We do not treat rent accounting as a separate calculator. For a large company, this is part of the overall landscape: contracts, assets, treasury, reporting, BI, audit, SAP → 1C migration and user support after launch.
ALROSA: KIISU SAP for rent
SAP outline, lease agreements, RAS, IFRS, tax accounting, PBU 18 and data quality.
Relevant for industrial companies with a large number of assets.AgroInvest: lease agreements
RE-FX, data migration, functional specifications, reporting acceleration and contract control.
A good example of the transition from disparate data to a controlled process.VTB: property management
SAP S/4HANA, real estate, rent, facilities, contracts and management environment.
Shows the connection between rental accounting and property management.The role of AI in lease accounting
AI should not independently make accounting decisions or change reporting without a methodologist and responsible owner. But it can dramatically reduce the manual workload of reading contracts, searching for terms, explaining discrepancies, and drafting analytics.
Analysis of contracts
Document AI helps to extract the term, object, payments, indexation, terms of extension, termination and security payments.
Change control
AI compares contract versions and highlights terms that may affect modification or revaluation.
RAG by methodology
The financial team receives answers on accounting policies, instructions, auditor FAQs and internal rules with links to sources.
Explanations of deviations
CFO Copilot can prepare draft comments: why a liability, asset, expense or payment forecast has changed.
Data quality
AI highlights incomplete contract cards, suspicious deadlines, non-standard rates, duplicate objects and discrepancies between systems.
Safety environment
Access to contracts, calculations and reporting is designed with roles, logs, data restrictions and human verification.
What does the business get?
| Result | Value |
|---|---|
| Unified rental accounting environment | Contracts, objects, schedules, calculations and reporting live in a managed system, and not in a set of local files. |
| Faster period closure | Fewer manual recalculations, more automated checks, clear discrepancies and control reports. |
| Less risk of reporting errors | The methodology, rates, timing, modifications and disclosures are fixed in the process and tested against the data. |
| Transparency of obligations | The CFO sees future payments, the impact on the balance sheet, plan-actual and forecasts for groups of objects, legal entities and periods. |
| Audit Readiness | There is an evidence pack: data sources, calculation rules, reconciliations, contract changes, history of adjustments and responsible owners. |
| Base for SAP migration → 1C | You can understand in advance what data and business rules need to be stored, where the risks are and how to test the target loop. |
Result Artifacts
- map of contracts, rental objects, process owners, accounting systems and data sources;
- description of the IFRS 16 / FSBU 25 methodology: classification, rates, terms, exceptions, modifications, disclosures and control procedures;
- target architecture of the ERP environment: 1C, SAP, contractual system, EDI, BI/DWH, integrations, roles and logs;
- data model for contracts, objects, schedules, rates, calculations, postings, disclosures and management analytics;
- rules for data migration and reconciliation: checksums, test contracts, historical balances and acceptance criteria;
- backlog of improvements, pilot plan, UAT scenarios, regulations, user instructions and roadmap of production launch;
- evidence pack for audit: calculations, sources, contract versions, changes, reconciliations, owners and decision protocols.
First practical step
It’s better to start not with choosing a system, but with a short diagnostic of lease accounting readiness. It shows where the main risk is: methodology, contracts, data quality, Excel dependence, SAP RE-FX, transition to 1C, integration, period closure or reporting to the auditor.
After diagnostics, you can choose a reasonable first stage: audit of contracts, pilot on one type of object, design of a target architecture, migration assessment SAP → 1C or implementation of a full-fledged lease accounting system.
Frequently asked questions
How does IFRS 16 differ from FSB 25?
IFRS 16 is the international lease standard, FSBU 25/2018 is the Russian lease accounting standard. Their logic is close, but implementation in Russia must take into account RAS, accounting policies, tax differences, source documents and Russian ERP processes.
Is it possible to start without completely replacing the system?
Yes. Often the first stage is an audit of contracts and settlements, normalization of the register, setting up control reports or a pilot on one class of objects.
What to do if lease accounting was already in SAP RE-FX?
It is necessary to save not only directories, but also business logic: objects, contracts, schedules, historical calculations, modification rules, reports and checksums for reconciliation.
How to connect rental accounting with 1C?
Through the target data model, accounting rules, integrations, roles, period closing and reports. It is important to determine in advance what lives in 1C, what is in the contractual system, what is in DWH and what data the auditor needs.
Where does AI really help?
In reading contracts, searching for terms, comparing versions, highlighting incomplete cards, RAG on methodology and preparing explanations. But accounting decisions must be approved by responsible specialists.
Which RESTART cases are relevant?
Sber, ALROSA, AgroInvest, VTB, Megafon, ER-Telecom, Lukoil and Bank Vozrozhdenie: these are public examples of working with leasing, SAP, ERP, real estate, contracts and reporting.
Let's discuss your environment
Describe the task, current systems, constraints, and expected results. We will offer a practical first step: diagnostics, pilot, audit, roadmap or project team.
