Companies with large pension deficits should report the status of their schemes more frequently, according to PwC.

The accountancy firm said most companies received quarterly or monthly updates showing the movements of schemes' assets and liabilities and should make this information public. Raj Mody, a PwC partner, said: "We have annual updates and disclosures through corporate reporting but these figures are out of date by the time they are published. Ideally, you would want a full actuarial valuation in real time but that is too labour intensive. However, companies can update, allowing for changes – the performance of investments, changes in bond yields or any big membership movements – and get a pretty accurate answer." Last week, PwC was among six accountancy firms, including KPMG, Deloitte & Touche and Ernst & Young, that teamed up to promote real-time corporate reporting for all company results. The accountants said the financial reporting model had become redundant and proposed continuous internet-based disclosure, including a wider variety of performance measures, rather than static quarterly accounts. Mody said his call for more accurate pensions reporting only made sense in that context. Pension schemes are often as big a reporting issue as a large subsidiary. British Airways, which said this month that union negotiations over its £2bn (€3bn) pensions shortfall were unresolved, provides updates on the scheme with every quarterly result. Mody said it was in companies' interests to report more frequently because they would avoid inaccurate estimates. "Companies will not suffer others making wrong estimates and have to spend time managing perceptions when they should be managing their business," he said. Separately, independent pensions consultant John Ralfe said last week that international accounting standards would push companies toward more pensions disclosure. In research for RBC Capital Markets, Ralfe said: "Most are still in the dark about the impact of longevity risk."