Summary of Significant Accounting Policies and Basis of Presentation (Policies)

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2013

Accounting Policies [Abstract]

Consolidation

Except as otherwise indicated or unless the context otherwise requires, “PRGX,” “we,” “us,” “our” and the “Company” refer to PRGX Global, Inc. and its subsidiaries.

Revenue Recognition, Unbilled Receivables and Refund Liabilities

Unbilled Receivables and Refund Liabilities

We base our revenue on specific contracts with our clients. These contracts generally specify: (a) time periods covered by the audit; (b) nature and extent of audit services we are to provide; (c) the client’s duties in assisting and cooperating with us; and (d) fees payable to us, generally expressed as a specified percentage of the amounts recovered by the client resulting from overpayment claims identified. Clients generally recover claims either by taking credits against outstanding payables or future purchases from the involved vendors, or receiving refund checks directly from those vendors. The manner in which a claim is recovered by a client often is dictated by industry practice. In addition, many clients establish specific procedural guidelines that we must satisfy prior to submitting claims for client approval, and these guidelines are unique to each client. For some services we provide, we earn our compensation in the form of a flat fee, a fee per hour, or a fee per other unit of service.

We generally recognize revenue for a contractually specified percentage of amounts recovered when we have determined that our clients have received economic value (generally through credits taken against existing accounts payable due to the involved vendors or refund checks received from those vendors) and when we have met the following criteria: (a) persuasive evidence of an arrangement exists; (b) services have been rendered; (c) the fee billed to the client is fixed or determinable; and (d) collectability is reasonably assured. In certain limited circumstances, we will invoice a client prior to meeting all four of these criteria; in such cases, we defer the revenue until we meet all of the criteria. Additionally, for purposes of determining appropriate timing of recognition and for internal control purposes, we rely on customary business practices and processes for documenting that we have met the criteria described in (a) through (d) above. Such customary business practices and processes may vary significantly by client. On occasion, it is possible that a transaction has met all of the revenue recognition criteria described above but we do not recognize revenue, unless we can otherwise determine that criteria (a) through (d) above have been met, because our customary business practices and processes specific to that client have not been completed.

Historically, there has been a certain amount of revenue with respect to which, even though we had met the requirements of our revenue recognition policy, our clients’ vendors ultimately have rejected the claims underlying the revenue. In that case, our clients may request a refund or offset of such amount even though we may have collected fees. We record any such refunds as a reduction of revenue. We provide refund liabilities for these reductions in the economic value previously received by our clients with respect to vendor claims we identified and for which we previously have recognized revenue. We compute an estimate of our refund liabilities at any given time based on actual historical refund data.

During the third quarter of 2011, we changed the point at which we recognize revenue for our Healthcare Claims Recovery Audit services within our New Services segment based on our gaining sufficient experience with auditing such claims. We now recognize revenue without formal client sign-off provided that we can objectively demonstrate that the acceptance criteria specified by the client are satisfied. This change resulted in a $1.4 million increase in revenue, a $0.4 million increase in net earnings and a $0.02 increase in basic and diluted earnings per common share in 2011.

Unbilled receivables relate to claims for which clients have received economic value but for which we contractually have agreed not to submit an invoice to the clients at such time. Unbilled receivables arise when a portion of our fee is deferred at the time of the initial invoice. At a later date (which can be up to a year after original invoice, and at other times a year after completion of the audit period), we invoice the unbilled receivable amount. Notwithstanding the deferred due date, our clients acknowledge that we have earned this unbilled receivable at the time of the original invoice, but have agreed to defer billing the client for the related services.

Unbilled receivables also arise in our Healthcare Claims Recovery Audit services as we generally cannot invoice the prime contractors for whom we operate as a subcontractor under the Medicare RAC program until cash is collected by the prime contractors. These unbilled receivables, net of the related reserves, were $5.6 million and $9.0 million as of December 31, 2013 and December 31, 2012, respectively. As of March 7, 2014, we billed $2.1 million of the unbilled receivables relating to the Medicare RAC program that were outstanding as of December 31, 2013.

New Accounting Standards

New Accounting Standards

No new accounting standards have been issued by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (“FASB”) and included in the Accounting Standards Codification (“ASC”) that PRGX has not yet adopted that we expect will have a significant impact on the Company's financial statements.