On 21 March 2019, the National Gas Rules as applied in Western Australia were amended by the adoption of the National Gas Amendment (Regulation of covered pipelines) Rule 2019 No. 1. Under Division 2 of Part 7 of the Rules (Provision of information by light regulation pipelines), service providers must now publish financial and weighted average price information to assist prospective users in assessing whether prices being offered by the service provider are reasonable. The ERA is required to publish and maintain a financial reporting guideline to assist in the preparation of this information. The ERA is also responsible for monitoring and enforcing compliance with the information disclosure requirements for light regulation pipelines under Division 2 of Part 7 of the National Gas Rules.
Rule 63 of Schedule 1 of the National Gas Rules required the ERA to publish an initial financial reporting guideline by no later than 31 October 2019. The ERA published its guideline, an explanatory statement and a reporting template on 31 October 2019.
On 23 October 2020, the ERA updated the financial reporting template to reflect changes in how leases are accounted for under standards set by the Australian Accounting Standards Board and other minor formatting amendments. The current template published on 30 June 2020 reflects additional changes to formulas, category and heading labelling, and formatting to correct errors, improve consistency, and enhance accessibility of reported information. All changes are documented in the Amendment record worksheet of the updated template.
