Audit readiness

What the work produces

We create a request tracker, reconcile schedules to the trial balance and coordinate management responses. Prior findings and open issues are linked to evidence rather than closed by assertion.

The agreed evidence pack can include indexed balance schedules, reconciliation workings, supporting-document references and a status report for outstanding requests. Each schedule identifies its reporting period and the ledger version to which it reconciles. Revised schedules remain distinguishable from copies already supplied.

We coordinate the preparation sequence with management and the appointed auditor’s request list. Where an item depends on another team or an external record, the tracker identifies that dependency rather than describing the item as ready.

Inputs to organise

• Auditor request list
• books and schedules
• bank and counterparty confirmations
• contracts
• board records
• prior observations.

Nominate owners for accounting, payroll, inventory, contracts and corporate records. Identify the final trial balance, material changes since earlier drafts and any accounts still being reconciled. Provide existing confirmation records where relevant; new confirmation procedures should follow the auditor’s instructions and control.

Share known gaps at the outset, including missing invoices, unresolved opening balances and differences between operational records and the ledger. If substantial reconstruction is needed, separate the cleanup assignment from the evidence-coordination timetable.

What good records help you see

A fixed-asset schedule should reconcile to the ledger and show additions, disposals and depreciation. Supplying a spreadsheet with an unexplained difference simply transfers the problem to the audit stage.

1. Map the requested schedule to the relevant ledger accounts and reporting period.
2. Check the opening balance, period movements and closing balance against the supporting workings.
3. Index the evidence for selected items requested by the auditor without substituting different items silently.
4. Record management’s factual explanation and proposed adjustment separately from the supporting document.
5. Track follow-up questions through to the response and preserve any remaining disagreement or uncertainty.

Example: equipment appears in the asset register but its purchase record is missing. Record the missing evidence, ask the responsible team to retrieve it and retain the response. An asset-register row alone should not be described as the complete purchase evidence.

Agree the boundaries

The auditor retains independent judgement and signing responsibility. This engagement prepares and coordinates evidence; it does not provide an audit opinion.

Before combining preparation and audit-related assignments, assess the appointed auditor’s relationships and the section 144 restrictions on non-audit services. The description “audit readiness” does not override those restrictions.

Confirm the covered entities, periods, systems, deliverables and fees before work starts.

Agree who prepares schedules, who approves management responses and who communicates them to the auditor. Management remains responsible for the records and its explanations. Readiness support does not determine the auditor’s procedures, replace their evidence assessment or guarantee an unmodified opinion.

The final handover identifies documents supplied, versions revised, questions answered and items still open. Any adjustments approved during the process should be coordinated with the bookkeeping team so later reports use the appropriate records.