ABSTRACT
As the name suggests, the annual report is produced once a year at about the same time and covers a twelvemonth period: a calendar year, academic year or fiscal year. Do not expect the annual report for a calendar year to be finished in January or even February. Besides time constraints there is the extra complication that the activities of the previous year are not fully concluded at that time, and invoices dealing with the previous year may not be available so soon. This is a typical disadvantage of annual or biennial invoicing. Although it saves time and money (banks charge for money transfers, especially international transfers) it results in financial data being available rather late. From our experience it seems that presenting an annual report in May or June is acceptable. Postponing it further might lead to decreased interest in the report altogether (which might lead to decreases in the library budget!). Moreover, when the librarian has not kept a well-organised diary of all events, postponing can lead to a number of activities being forgotten, especially those for which no numerical data were collected.
