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This month check out Pentana, software for audit professionals, including integrated risk and audit management, staff scheduling and information security questionnaires.

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Following Fundamentals Detects Fraud

By Eileen Galager, Protiviti Manager and Kyle Furtis, Protiviti Managing Director

Executing the fundamentals of auditing - performing basic audit steps and following up on "loose ends" - can be the key to uncovering fraud. In this case study, Protiviti's Kyle Furtis and Eileen Galager share a story of when an audit committee's fraud suspicions were well warranted.

Click here for the rest of the story!

This article was contributed by Protiviti KnowledgeLeader, an online service providing tools, templates, and other resources for internal audit and risk management. Free trials available at www.knowledgeleader.com. For a limited time KnowledgeLeader memberships are available for the reduced rate of $595 per year. Tell them you heard about it from AuditNet.org.

Resume Tune-Ups

Best foot forward!

by Robbie Miller Kaplan

Resumes get such a quick scan that an applicant must highlight their strengths to get noticed. Profiles and summaries are attention grabbers; they’re the first area an employer scans and the best place to showcase expertise and achievements. Information that follows should be next in importance, continually followed by credentials of diminishing importance.

Mark’s first page contains an overview of his credentials, skills, education and training. This information, usually secondary in importance, is often detailed on page two. Employers are seeking applicants who have solved problems similar to their own so experience and achievements belong on page one.

Certifications are important and Mark could add the CISA, PMP and CBM designations after his name, moving the specifics to page two under its own “certifications” heading. The quote on page one is so specific I’d save it for a cover letter written for a job that requires just that experience. Education and training belong on page two.

Mark’s had many different jobs and the experience area highlights just that. It would help to minimize the list by including the job title, organization, city, state and dates on one line, eliminating the months. Use bold just to emphasize the job titles, using regular text for the organization names.

Experience statements should detail contributions; they can be re-written once Mark has determined what he did differently that wasn’t done before, what problems he solved and what he achieved.

For example:
“Saved over $80,000 for major publisher by centralizing License Management for Business Objects and renegotiating terms.”

It’s essential to be consistent; Mark uses different bullet shapes and different indents. And watch for redundancy. Try substituting detected, disclosed, established or uncovered for identified and led, oversaw, administered or directed for managed.

Get a Free Resume Analysis!

AuditNet Adds a New Career Feature: The Resume Tune-Up.

Nationally recognized resume expert and author of How to Say It In Your Job Search, Robbie Miller Kaplan will select one auditor resume each month and suggest ways to transform the resume from passable to powerful.

If you would like your resume to be considered for a tune-up, please e-mail it to Ms. Kaplan. You will be notified by e-mail if your resume is selected. You will need to make yourself available via e-mail to answer a few questions with a tight deadline.  Ms. Kaplan will send a critique and suggestions to the individual selected and a summary Resume Tune-Up will appear in the monthly newsletter column.  If selected you give AuditNet the right to display your resume for the column.

AuditNet^® What's New This Month?

30 Day Trial Offer

AuditNet launched a 30 day trial offer for access to the premium content. Simply send in an original audit work program, register for access to the audit work programs and I will upgrade your access to the premium content for 30 days. You can extend this trial offer to one year by contributing four more audit work programs. 

PricewaterhouseCoopers Global Best Practices shared an excellent paper of Building Blocks for Effective Corporate Boards. Make sure you share this with your audit committee!

Auditor's Dozen Renewal Offer

Have you let your subscription to AuditNet expire? If so then have I got a deal for you! Renew your AuditNet subscription by the end of the month and I will throw in an extra month on your subscription renewal. In other words you will get 13 months for the price of 12 or as I like to call it; the Auditor's Dozen. Process your renewal payment today as this is a limited time offer!

AuditNet Server Upgrade

AuditNet is moving the Web site to a dedicated server. Please be patient and be sure to report broken links that you encounter.

Pay by Phone or FAX

AuditNet is now set up to accept credit card payments for subscriptions by phone or fax. If you are interested in this option click here!

Writing for AuditNet?

AuditNet Editorial Guidelines

Based on the number of articles being contributed to AuditNet we have developed editorial guidelines for future submissions.  If you are planning to write an article please review the guidelines before submission.  We appreciate receiving material from the global audit community in the interest of sharing knowledge. We are also in the process of guidelines for book reviews and other material submitted for inclusion on AuditNet.

Get Audit Related Books Free!

Interested in developing your writing skills with having access to the latest audit and business related books? AuditNet is looking for auditors that would like to review books for the benefit of the audit community. This is an excellent way to build your professional publication library and provide a valuable service for AuditNet users. A list of available books will be provided on request.  For the guidelines click here.

New Benefits of Registration

AuditNet receives many questions on what kind of audit related information is available on the Internet and where to find it. As a result of my research to find the answers to those questions I discover value added resources that are useful for auditors. In the past these resources would have been added to the AuditNet Links Page (aka KARL). To provide an incentive for auditors to register on AuditNet I will begin loading these links to a special page that is only available to registered users.

AuditNet forges new relationships with professional associations and accounting sites to provide auditors with access to audit work programs.

Professional Association Access to AuditNet Audit Programs.

If you want your professional association (IIA, ISACA, ACFE, ACUA, ACUIA etc) to have transparent access to AuditNet audit programs and other content as a benefit of membership contact your professional association official and ask them to pursue this with AuditNet.

Fraud News Feed

Go to the AuditNet Fraud Resource Center and check out the fraud news feed to keep up to date with media reported fraud happenings. 

Audit Programs

The audit programs section of AuditNet requires registration in order to access.  New audit program contributions are available only to paid subscribers or on a one-for-one exchange basis. However 181 standard management audit programs were added this month to the free content thanks to Professor Andrew Chambers of the UK. There are over 65,000 registered users. A multi-user subscription rate was added to the individual subscription program to the premium content. Organizations that need more than 2 staff members accessing the service will benefit from this new rate. There are new additions to the premium audit programs available as an alternative for those auditors that are unable to contribute material to AuditNet®. Site licenses are also available for organizations with more than 15 users.

The best way to find all the resources on the site is by going to the Virtual Library or use the site search.

Internal Auditor Recognized by Global Organization
for Innovative Advancement of the Profession

ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, Fla. (July 11, 2007)  — In honor of his outstanding contributions to the internal audit profession, James Kaplan, CIA, was awarded by The Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) with the prestigious Bradford Cadmus Memorial Award during The IIA’s 2007 International Conference, held in Amsterdam this week. Initiated in 1965, the award is named after The IIA’s first managing director and recognizes internal audit practitioners for research, academic involvement, article and book publication, and other thought-leading pursuits.

For the complete press release click here!

As procurement systems become increasingly automated and process larger numbers of payments, the need for both preventive and detective controls over fraud takes on greater importance. Regardless of how well controls are designed and implemented, there is invariably an opportunity for error or fraud, especially if participants are sufficiently motivated. Thus the auditor should perform at least some analytical tests, in order to comply with SAS 99 and satisfy that basic controls are functioning as intended. However, too often this process can be likened to searching for a “needle in a haystack,” simply due to the sheer volume of records.

This article describes several approaches that are suitable for examining very substantial volumes of transactions. It has been written for dual purposes; 1) to provide insight and support to the practicing auditor of techniques that can be applied in real world situations and 2) be used as the basis for course exercises and assignments in accounting/auditing courses for students wishing to enter the audit profession.

This article is patterned closely upon the information included in the audit report published by the Wake County School Public School (WCPSS) Board in response to two frauds. Although much of the article and scenarios described are based on official reports, all of the data, including names, numbers and amounts are strictly fictitious and have been changed.

For the complete article including the link to the sample data click here!

For Automating the Fixed Asset Audit article by Mike click here!

About the author: Mike Blakley is currently an IT auditor with the State of North Carolina, Department of Health and Human Services. Mike maintains a blog devoted to audit software topics at http://blog.ezrstats.com and his e-mail address is Mike.Blakley@ezrstats.org.

*Data Analysis Tools and Techniques for Auditors

Recovery Auditing: Reducing Profit Leaks

It's no wonder that the audit recovery business is thriving and evolving. Many companies are currently benefiting from the services of a recovery audit firm.

Here are some of the reasons why:

People in companies are always fighting a six-headed hydra, constantly focusing on the dragon head that is currently snapping at them. Therefore, there is little time for improvement, best practices, and the tedium involved in reviewing transactions for recovery.

Companies are constantly downsizing and outsourcing. This creates additional issues due to a "lack of touch" by the people working the process with those who developed the process. This is coupled with the fact that accounts payable departments are constantly understaffed, overworked, and receive a relatively small portion of the budget for technology improvement purchases.

Most accounting systems were built to process transactions and not to provide users access to the data for reporting purposes. Data analysis is critical in obtaining recoveries. Further, recovery auditors are skilled in data analysis and the types of reports that are the most fruitful. Therefore, it is best to learn from them by watching them on a few engagements.

With all of the reasons, see the articles below on how companies can save money.

Richard B. Lanza, CPA/CITP, CFE, PMP
President - Cash Recovery Partners, LLC
Phone: 973-601-3701
Email: rich@richlanza.com

LOOKING FOR
THE LARGEST FISH

Many companies, after completing a risk assessment, want to immediately catch every fish – big or small. However, just as it’s impossible for a batter to hit five
baseballs pitched at the same time, a company with a limited fraud detection budget won’t be able to correct every problem at the same time. You need to determine not just the likelihood of the frauds but their significance as you make your priority list. You can do this qualitatively but because we need to “follow the money,” the quantitative data analysis usually is most beneficial.

To read the rest of this article click here!

Upcoming Webinars and Events

October 16, 2007 -	Risk Webinar brought to you by MrExcel.com and AuditSoftware.Net
October 17, 2007	Power Excel Webinar brought to you by MrExcel.com and AuditSoftware.Net
October 23, 2007	The "Rx" for Rx Claims - Presented by Health Decisions, Inc.
November 13, 2007	Declaring WARR - Presented by Health Decisions, Inc.

Access to the free audit program section now requires registration.  The following audit programs, ICQs, checklists or working papers were added this month. They are available on a 1 for 1 exchange for an original audit work program not currently in the inventory. If you unable to share audit programs then consider subscribing to the premium content which provides you with access free and premium content 24/7/365.  Interested in previewing all the programs in the premium content section? Contribute an original audit work program not currently in the inventory and receive a 30 day trial subscription to the premium content. Contribute 5 programs and receive a one year trial subscription. (Offer only available for new programs submitted).

When Sarbanes-Oxley passed in 2002, it forced many companies to take an in-depth look at internal
Accounts Payable controls. Implementing internal controls takes time, but may prove to be a very cost- effective measure if any fraud or leakages are found. The following approaches, requiring some degree of
data mining and programming capability, are fairly straightforward and should tighten up your A/P audit.

For Part Two of this article click here!

If you missed Part One of this article click here!

A: For best practices on inventory counts such as fixed assets I suggest using the following document:

Best Practices in Achieving Consistent, Accurate Physical Counts of Inventory and Related Property which can be found at this link.

Here is an excerpt that mentions when and what to count. In order to count an appropriate amount of the total inventory, management must decide which inventory items to count and how frequently those items should be counted. The most desirable goal would be to count all of the inventory items at least once a year. However, maintaining accurate inventory records by counting items takes time and costs money. Since there are typically limits on these resources, the best way to balance control of the inventory and cost of the count is to focus on the items determined to be more important or of higher risk to the organization. Accordingly, it is not always practical to give the same treatment to each item; it may be desirable to segment the inventory into identifiable classes and assess the risk for each segment or class to determine the frequency of counts.

If you have a question for Ask the Auditor click here!

AuditNet is interested in developing a series of SOx or industry related audit programs for organizations. If anyone is interested in writing audit programs, ICQs, questionnaires, or control matrices on a work for hire basis please contact me. If you may know of anyone who would be interested in this as well please pass along my contact information.

AuditNet Construction Corner News