An arrangement/ technique that aims to create a misleading impression about the financial position of an entity. For example, this may involve a reduction in the balance of accounts receivable and moving the corresponding amount to cash, which will have no effect on an entity’s income for a respective period. This only can make cash balance look better.

In general, window dressing involves all deceptive intervention to manipulate balances within a specific financial period/ year and beyond or record specific events or transactions that occur after the close of a current year’s accounts in a bid to make matters seem better at the ending date of a financial period.

Window dressing is one tool (in addition to off-balance sheet reporting) of the so-called creative accounting.