The origin and evolution of charts of accounts in Poland

Charts of accounts have played a vital role in the development of accountancy in Poland since the Second World War. In the period of the centrally-run economy the accounting of enterprises was based on uniform requirements. They included, among other things, the obligation to conduct accounting according to uniform or standard charts of accounts, which were frequently changed or modified temporarily. The radical political and economic transition in Poland after 1990 brought about changes to legal rules regulating accountancy. The changes aimed to reduce their number and complexity. Under the new legislation, business entities (apart from those in the budgetary sector and banks) develop individually their own plans of accounts which are best suited to financial reporting and management accounting purposes. This paper aims to give a synthetic presentation of the causes and effects of successive reforms of Polish plans of accounts as well as current practice concerning individual enterprise accounting plans.