The SIE format is an open standard for transferring accounting data between different software produced by different software suppliers. SIE could be used to transfer data between software on the same computer, but also used for sending data between companies, for example between the company, the accountant and the audit. It can also be used for transferring from trade pre-systems like payables,

receivable Accounts receivable, abbreviated as AR or A/R, are legally enforceable claims for payment held by a business for goods supplied or services rendered that customers have ordered but not paid for. These are generally in the form of invoices raised b ...

s and salary systems to accounting as well as from accounting to tax administrative special applications.

File format

SIE is a tagged text file format, not

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable ...

XBRL GL The XBRL Global Ledger Taxonomy Framework (XBRL GL) is a holistic and generic XML and XBRL-based representation of the detailed data that can be found in accounting and operational systems, and is meant to be the bridge from transactional standard ...

and

UN/CEFACT UN/CEFACT is the United Nations Centre for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business. It was established as an intergovernmental body of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) in 1996 and evolved from UNECE's long tradition of ...

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technology, but about 20 times compacter file format. The SIE files are in five sections: * General information * Used chart of accounts declaration * Used dimension/object (identifiers) of accounting declaration (making object related accounting analyse possible from SIE data) * Balances of accounts (of this, last and possibly more previous years, for the total and for each object) * Accounting entries (of this year)

History

A non-profit organization (The SIE Group) was formed in 1992 by leading Swedish accounting software vendors and accounting specialist (accountants/auditors interest groups). The accounting data file interchange file format rapidly gained market support, and is now implemented in all accounting software on the Swedish market. It is also used by government bodies, such as the Swedish Tax Authority, Statistics Sweden and The Economic Crimes Authority. SIE is closely related to the Swedish standard charts of accounts organisation

BAS (accounting) The Swedish BAS chart of accounts (Basic chart), represents the Swedish accounting generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) and is an open to use chart of accounts for accounting in Sweden available in Swedish, English and German language t ...

(the most advanced and fully covering standard account chart in the world), and SIE is one of the owning members of BAS. However the SIE file format works with any charts of accounts and is technically independent of BAS. Together the SIE file format and the standard chart of accounts make a strong concept for accounting information interchange that has proven simple and efficient. SIE has since 2012 a close cooperation with

XBRL XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) is a freely available and global framework for exchanging business information. XBRL allows the expression of semantic meaning commonly required in business reporting. The language is XML-based an ...

Sweden. SIE is not an official SIS (

Swedish Standards Institute The Swedish Institute for Standards (SIS), is an independent organization, founded in 1922, with members from the private and public sector. Activities SIS and its members develop standards within different domains, including construction, safety, ...

local

ISO ISO is the most common abbreviation for the International Organization for Standardization. ISO or Iso may also refer to: Business and finance * Iso (supermarket), a chain of Danish supermarkets incorporated into the SuperBest chain in 2007 * Iso ...

) national standard. The SIE Group provides the SIE File format as an open standard. The SIE Group is however a member of SIS.

A large Swedish domestic market implementation rate

Due to the fact that the SIE standard is so well spread in the software business in Sweden it has become a de facto standard for transferring accounting data in Sweden. The format is open to everyone, but only SIE members can get their software approved.

A vendor interest group, not a standards organisation

As a vendor interest group SIE is not bound to the statements of neutrality against proprietary solutions of regular standards organisations. That makes the SIE specification also include implementation instruction layer that is not possible in official standards organisations work. The implementation instruction layer has helped a lot in limiting dialects and makes certain the information interchange work in practice. Beside the vendors are members this is a key of the huge implementation rate in the Swedish domestic market.

International aspect

The file format was originally developed for the Swedish market only, and the record tags in the file format was given Swedish names. To overcome that a revised and XML-based version of the file format (SIE 5) was released in 2018. The new file format has however not yet replaced the older file formats.

External links

SIE

XBRL

BAS Swedish standard chart of accounts

References

* {{cite web , title = The SIE formats , url = https://sie.se/format/ , accessdate = 20 September 2021 Accounting software Computer file formats