Scrip Dividends and DRIP Elections
This screen should be used to advise the system where an election has been made to receive a dividend in shares as opposed to cash whether by a scrip dividend or dividend reinvestment plan.
Elections
Elections can be made to take individual dividends in shares, by specifying the ex dividend date, or to elect to take all dividends in the year as shares.
Furthermore you may choose to make the election "permanent" in which case select the Permanent Election option and it will be carried forward from year to year.
Wherever a Permanent Election is made it will replace any existing Annual Election and vice versa.
Should you wish to cancel an Election at any time you may do so by using this screen.
For Scrip Dividends that go "Ex" at the end of one tax year, but are not paid until the following tax year, then the election must be made in the earlier year - this does not apply to dividend reinvestment plan elections.
In situations where you have already started working on the later year and you find that an election was made towards the end of the previous period, which you were previously unaware of, then the best approach is to reprocess the earlier year and re-extract the closing balances.
However if you take this approach take care to check that any changes you may have made to the opening balances are not overwritten by the re-extraction exercise.
Many Scrip Dividend and Dividend Reinvestment Plans offer the ability to carry forward unused cash fractions so that an additional share can be purchased when enough money has been accumulated. In this scenario the Scrip Dividend or DRIP should be overwritten, using the Sundries screen, to reflect the additional share and additional cost.
Please note that the Scrip Dividend Election facility is not available for years earlier than 1991/92 - the Dividend Reinvestment Election facility is available for years 2007/08 and later.
Scrip Dividends and Drip Elections Window Options
| Field | Description |
| Security Code | Enter the Code for the Security in question. If you are unaware of the Code then this can easily be established by invoking the Security Code Lookup Facility. To do this simply position your cursor within the Security Code field and then either double click or press the F5 key on your keyboard. |
| Election Type | Select the appropriate radio button to indicate whether the election is a scrip dividend or a dividend reinvestment plan. |
| Specific Dividend | Click this button if you are simply making the election for one dividend. |
| Annual Election | Click this button if you require all dividends in the year to be paid as stock. |
| Permanent Election | Click this button if you require all future dividends to be paid as stock. |
| Ex Div Date | Enter the relevant ex dividend date if you are making an election for a specific dividend to be paid as scrip. |