[Goblin greetings from London, England,
I am writing to politely inform you that there I have spotted some mistranslations present in your interim financial statements. I am sure you are aware that a serious mistranslation could undermine your reputation with your shareholders.
As you know, we are, unfortunately, bound by muggle accounting standards. As such, it is vital that you use the appropriate terms. An "exceptional result" is when Slytherin wins the Quidditch cup and is never appropriate in financial reporting. "Résultat exceptionnel" must be translated as "Non-recurring income".
Speaking of standards, you repeatedly refer to "Accounting Guidelines". We can only assume this is a mistranslation of the French word "référentiel". The correct term is "Accounting Basis".
The term "amount" is repeatedly misused. The French term "montant", in this context, should be translated as "total". We spotted this error in your Statement of Financial Position ("the amount of non-current assets”) and in your Cashflow statement ("amount of cashflows"). It is all very confusing for the reader and, no-doubt, off-putting to investors.
One would have hoped that the Notes to the Financial Statements would have served to clarify things somewhat. Alas, due to grammatical issues, these hopes were thwarted. The sentence "IAS 16 intends" made us shudder. A document cannot intend something unless you know of a magical spell we are unaware of. Indeed, given the inappropriate use of the word "the", we can only assume that you have fallen under some kind of curse resulting in the excessive use of the definite article.
Should you wish to avoid similar mistakes in your annual report, may I recommend a muggle translator named Ruth Bartlett. Unfortunately, she cannot be contacted by Owl Post, but you can find out more information at www.wordsted.co.uk.
Yours faithfully,
Wurdsteed,
Head of Financial Reporting at Gringotts Wizarding Bank
P.S. I’m travelling to Dijon with my family soon. Can you get me a good Galleon = Bezant exchange rate? Ta!]
