RJ 620: the annual accounts of a cooperative

The short answer

RJ 620 applies to cooperatives and the European cooperative society (SCE); the mutual insurance association (onderlinge waarborgmaatschappij) follows RJ 605. Title 9 applies in full. The chapter mainly governs whether member participations are equity or liabilities, the operating account with member payments, inventories supplied by members and the disclosure of all receivables from and liabilities to members.

Updated 30 October 2026

Key facts

Why the cooperative has a chapter of its own

A cooperative runs a business for its members. A fruit grower supplies his harvest, an energy customer buys power, a care provider shares purchasing. Two flows therefore run over the same members: goods and money in the operations, and capital through participations or member accounts. The prices between cooperative and members are moreover often not market prices, because the result ends up with the members anyway.

An ordinary profit and loss account then says little, whether member capital is equity depends on the repayment rules, and a reader wants to see what the cooperative and its members owe each other. That is what RJ 620 is about; otherwise the ordinary chapters apply (RJ 620.107).

Participations: equity or liabilities

The cooperative assesses each participation against all conditions: law, articles of association and house rules (RJ 620.203). The route then differs per set of annual accounts.

• Company-only annual accounts. You choose between legal form and economic reality (RJ 240, paragraph 503; for micro and small RJk B8.106). If you choose legal form and a participation is economically a liability, you show that part as a separate item within equity (RJ 240.505).
• Consolidated annual accounts. Here economic reality decides, via RJ 290 and RJ 620.204. The part of the participations subject to a repayment prohibition is equity. The part the cooperative must repay is a liability, unless the participations have all the characteristics of a puttable instrument that may nevertheless count as equity (RJ 290.808).

If the repayment prohibition shifts, for example through an amendment of the articles, an amount moves between equity and liabilities. The notes then state the amount, the moment and the reason. Participations in equity are stated at the amount the members contributed. Participations in liabilities are stated at the present value of what the cooperative must repay; the unwinding is interest expense (RJ 620.205 and 620.206).

Operating account and member payments

2. Cooperatives and the foundations and associations referred to in article 360(3) replace the profit and loss account with an operating account, if the insight referred to in article 362(1) is thereby served; the provisions on the profit and loss account apply to this account as far as possible by analogy. Provisions on profit and loss apply as far as possible by analogy to the operating balance.

In a cooperative that buys from its members, determining profit and appropriating profit are intertwined: what the members receive for their product is at the same time the distribution of the result. RJ 620.301 shows this in an operating account that first shows a result before member payments and below it the member payments: the advances during the year plus the final payment. The costs of what was not bought from members remain ordinary costs.

Transactions with members fall under RJ 330 Related parties (RJ 620.302). Because member prices need not be at market level, the disclosure on those transactions is essential for a reader.

Inventories supplied by members

If the cooperative values its inventory at cost, it may use an approximate cost for goods from members: the price agreed with the members for that year (RJ 620.201). That is logical, because the actual price is only fixed after the final payment. The notes explain how the valuation is arrived at.

Notes, other information and management report

• The total of all receivables from members and the total of all liabilities to members, including participations, in the balance sheet or the notes (RJ 620.202, a firm statement).
• For a cooperative B.A.: the extent of the members' liability (RJ 620.404).
• In the other information, the provision in the articles on members' contribution to a deficit, if it deviates from the law. This does not apply to a small cooperative, because art. 2:396(7) DCC exempts it from art. 2:392 DCC.
• In the management report, the recommendation to state whether the cooperative follows a code of conduct, such as the NCR code for cooperative entrepreneurship, and whether that is mandatory or voluntary (RJ 620.401).
• The Dutch Annual Accounts Formats Decree (Besluit modellen jaarrekening) is formally written for the NV and the BV; the RJ recommends following it as far as possible (RJ 620.402).

c. a description of the provision in the articles of association on contributing to a deficit of a cooperative or mutual insurance association, insofar as it deviates from the statutory provisions;

Case: Fruit cooperative Lingebloesem U.A.

Fruit cooperative Lingebloesem U.A. (fictitious) sorts, stores and sells the apples and pears of its growers. At the start of 2026 it has 80 members; one member leaves in June. Each member holds eight participations of € 1.000: two founding participations, which are never repaid as long as the cooperative exists, and six free participations, which the member gets back on leaving. The cooperative has € 21 mln turnover, 62 employees and just over € 9 mln of assets: it is medium-sized and follows RJ 620 directly.

Participations. The founding participations of all 80 (former) members, 160 × € 1.000 = € 160.000, are subject to an absolute repayment prohibition: equity. The free participations of the 79 remaining members, 474 × € 1.000 = € 474.000, are economically a liability; that is how they appear in the group's consolidated annual accounts. The departing member received € 6.000 back: a repayment of a liability, not a decrease in equity. If the cooperative chooses legal form in its company-only annual accounts, the entire member capital of € 634.000 is under equity, with the € 474.000 as a separate item.

Inventory. On 31 December there are 1.200 tonnes of apples in the cold store, supplied by members at an agreed price of € 0,52 per kilo. The inventory is stated at 1.200.000 × € 0,52 = € 624.000.

Members in the notes. The cooperative has € 210.000 to receive from members for packaging material supplied. It owes the members € 1.274.000: the final payment of € 800.000 and the free participations of € 474.000. Both totals appear in the notes.

Had Lingebloesem been small, it would have followed the RJk. The classification of participations then runs via RJk B8.106, the profit and loss account may be condensed to gross operating result (art. 2:396(4) DCC) and the other information falls away.

By size class

The thresholds apply to financial years starting on or after 1 January 2024 and are counted on two consecutive balance sheet dates. An SCE also falls under RJ 620; a mutual insurance association is an insurer and appears in the overview of RJ 600 to 615.

RJ 620 in financial years 2025 to 2027

RJ 620 was last amended in 2019 and applies in this form to reporting years from 2020. For financial years 2025, 2026 and 2027, nothing in the chapter changes. For small cooperatives, one point is new in the 2027 RJk edition that affects them directly: where the Besluit modellen jaarrekening is not mandatory, the RJk recommends following it as far as possible (A2.114a).

Common mistakes

• Showing all participations as equity without reading the repayment rules.
• Counting only loans, not trade receivables, in the receivables from members.
• Hiding member payments among the ordinary purchase costs.

How it works in Jaarrekening.io

In Jaarrekening.io the cooperative follows the ordinary annual accounts route. The app asks whether there are member participations and whether the repayment arrangement changed during the year, whether inventories from members were valued at member prices, and what the total is of receivables from and liabilities to members, with participations that count as liabilities. The app creates the income statement in the profit and loss account format; if you want an operating account with a member payments line, the check reports that you are adjusting that layout yourself. An SCE cannot be created.

Sources

• Art. 2:361 DCC: operating account (wetten.overheid.nl)
• Art. 2:392 DCC: other information
• Art. 2:396 DCC: small entities
• Art. 2:360 DCC: scope of Title 9
• Dutch Accounting Standards Board: the Guidelines

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