7.07 The Financial review gives the wrong payment date for the 2024 interim dividend, and the 2025 report repeats it
UK Company A · a UK-listed medical technology group · Drafting slip
In brief
The Financial review says the 2024 interim dividend of [n] [currency units] a share was paid on [date]. The dividends note in the same report says it was paid on [date], which is also the date the company announced. The Annual Report 2025 repeats [date] as its comparative.
The evidence, as filed
Screenshot withheld to protect the company’s identity: Annual Report 2024, page 27; Annual Report 2025, page 25; Annual Report 2024, page 242. Their wording or layout could lead back to the company even with names and figures masked; the evidence list below records what each page shows.
What the report shows, and what the rule requires
| What the annual report shows | What the rule requires |
|---|---|
| What the annual report shows Financial review: interim dividend 'was paid on [date]'; dividends note to the Group accounts: 'paid [date]'; Annual Report 2025 Financial review comparative: '(2024: [date])' | What the rule requires One payment date, [date], in the Financial review of both reports, agreeing with Note 19.3 |
Why it matters
A reader comparing the Financial review with the notes finds two payment dates for the same dividend; the slip has now been carried into a second Annual Report.
Exposure
Narrative slip; no amount or required disclosure is wrong.
Our workings
the capital allocation paragraph of the 2024 Financial review states that the 2024 interim dividend of [n] [currency units] per share, totalling [amount], was paid on [date]. Note 19.3 to the Group accounts states the same dividend was paid [date]. The half-year results announcement of [date] and the sterling-amount announcement of [date] both gave [date] as the payment date, so the note is right and the Financial review is wrong. The Annual Report 2025 carries the same wrong date forward as the comparative in its own Financial review.
Management’s best defence, and our reply
Management could say the paragraph is narrative outside the audited statements, that the amount paid is correct, and that the audited note gives the right date, so no reader is misled about what was paid. They could add that the date is immaterial to any decision. That does not make the sentence right: the Financial review states a fact that the company's own note and announcements contradict, and the same wrong date was copied into the next year's report, so the cross-check between narrative and notes did not catch it twice.
The fix
- Correct the comparative in the Annual Report 2026 Financial review to read 'paid on [date]' if the 2024 interim is referred to again, and tie every dividend date in the Financial review to the dividends note before approval.
Evidence relied on
| # | What it shows | Type | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Financial review gives [date] as the payment date of the 2024 interim dividend | Document | Annual Report 2024, page 27 |
| 2 | Note 19.3 Dividends gives [date] for the same dividend | Document | Annual Report 2024, page 242 |
| 3 | The Annual Report 2025 Financial review repeats [date] as the prior-year payment date | Document | Annual Report 2025, page 25 |
Prepared by Pramanex from the company’s published annual reports, without the company’s involvement, to show how an annual report review reads. The company is not named, and nothing on this page is a statement about any identifiable company. Observations are not an audit, review or other assurance engagement, and not legal advice. A regulator-style question is a question, not a conclusion.
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