The Role of the Double Account System in York and North Midland Railway Company.

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  • York and North Midland鉄道会社の複会計システムの役割
  • York and North Midland テツドウ ガイシャ ノ フクカイケイ システム ノ ヤクワリ

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British railway companies in the nineteenth century adopted an unusual form for financial report, the 'double account system'. In a financial report prepared by this system, a balance sheet, which is prepared by the common manufacturing industry, is divided into the fixed items group and the floating items group. The prior literature concludes that the double account system had adopted by many railways in order to recover the stockholders' trust loosed with the accounting irregularities, and had, as one of its purposes, the potential for making a proper distinction between capital and revenue expenditure. Moreover, there is also a substantial amount of literature that shows that railway companies sometimes failed to make a proper distinction between capital and revenue despite the fact that they used the system. However, in fact, many railway companies, especially from 1840 to 1865, usually failed to make a proper distinction because they gave priority to a certain dividend over the proper distinction. They used the suspense account and double account system in order to postpone charging the expenditure to revenue, and in the many cases, to capitalize the expenditure. As a result shareholders were easily able to agree about these irregular account processes. In this report, the change in the role of the double account system is discussed by focusing on the development of financial reporting practice in the York and North Midland Railway.

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