The Auditing Practices Board, part of the Financial Reporting uncil has issued guidance for auditors on the use of XBRL.

Richard Fleck, chairman of the APB and a director of the FRC said: “XBRL tagging of UK statutory financial statements is required for tax purposes in 2011."

"This guidance provides background information on that requirement and on the application of APB’s Ethical Standards for Auditors to non-audit services relating to XBRL tagging," he added.

The guidance has information on HM Revenue & Customs future requirement of XBRL tagging as well as threats to be nsidered.

XBRL, which stands for eXtensible Business Reporting Language, is a mputer language for business information. Individual terms or information can be tagged through with machine readable des. The des are drawn from a library referred to as taxonomy.

The use of XBRL will make mpany information my aessible, and reviewable.

The APB has said as this is a developing technology and area, with XBRL likely to beme integrated in acunting systems, it intends to produce updated guidance in the future as necessary.

XBRL tagging of information in audited financial statements, guidance for auditors bulletin is available to view on the FRC web