QAPE
ExpeNditure Statements

To apply for a final certificate your expenditure statements must be accurate and reconciled.

One of the most important tasks for Screen Australia in assessing applications for final certification is to establish that expenditure has been incurred and, in turn, what proportion of the total expenditure is QAPE.

Listed below is a summary of the documents that we require in order to do that.

General Ledger

The general ledger is the key part of the expenditure statement that you are required to submit as part of the final certificate application.

To meet the requirements in rule 28 of the Producer Offset Rules 2018, the general ledger should include the following details:

• a description of each budget item;
• the amount of expenditure, including the cost/rate (usually per week);
• details of each service provider (including the name of the person performing the role and the company, if relevant); 
• the dates the work was performed and goods and services were provided; and
• where the work was performed.

Applications without a detailed general ledger including the above information, or with an incomplete or incorrect general ledger, cannot be assessed and will be delayed, denied or rejected. Lump sum payments in the general ledger cannot be assessed

Subset of the General Ledger

The subset of the General Ledger will contain only the production expenditure accounts for the film. The total of this subset must match the total film expenditure (TFE) in column (A) of the Final QAPE spreadsheet.

Please ask your accountant to include the subset of the General Ledger as worksheet (b)(ii) in the QAPE spreadsheet, with links to the QAPE worksheet (b).

To enable the links it is preferable for the subset of the General Ledger to include columns showing QAPE and Non-QAPE allocations for each line of the General Ledger.

Cost Report

The final cost report should be prepared according to industry standard practice.

This will include total expenditure to date (based on the General Ledger), accrued expenditure and estimates to complete all of which adds to the Total Final Costs (TFC) of the film.

Total Final Expenditure will exclude unsubstantiated accrued expenditure and any estimate to complete or contingency items not yet spent. It is likely Total Final Expenditure (TFE) in the QAPE spreadsheet may differ from Total Final Costs in the cost report.  Please provide a reconciliation of the difference.

Estimates to Complete

Matching documentation must be supplied (e.g. contract/tax invoice) to substantiate any estimate to complete expenditure.

Please note, if costs in the estimate to complete column have not been paid, i.e. the amount left in the budget to spend, such costs will only be QAPE if contracts or invoices are in place. 

QAPE spreadsheet

The QAPE spreadsheet will contain all expenditure compiled from the General Ledger with General Ledger codes, applicant’s exclusions and total QAPE.

It is mandatory that you download and use the most recent version of the final QAPE spreadsheet.

Detailed Non-QAPE report

Please provide a detailed report listing the breakdown of non-QAPE expenditure preferably as a subset of the General Ledger, the sum of which matches the total of applicant exclusions on the Final QAPE spreadsheet.

Audit 

The expenditure statements must be audited by an independent registered Australian auditor in accordance with the Corporations Act 2001.

‘Independent’ means that the auditor must not be an officer, employee or partner of the applicant, or of a related body corporate of the applicant.

Production audit (where available)

This is the audit of the total production costs of the film in accordance with the film’s budget categories and in a form satisfactory to Screen Australia. The Auditor must be a registered Company Auditor independent of the applicant company and the producer.

In the absence of a production audit please provide a Statement of Investor’s Funds or a Balance Sheet.