The Audit Report |
February
2025 |
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Monthly Commentary |
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Welcome to the New Year, and happy Waitangi Day. Having attended Waitangi many times in the past (an advantage of living in Northland) we will be missing it this year unfortunately. It's always a great day.
There has been a lot of interest in our Conference. We have around 100 people attending so far, including some on-line. If you still wish to register please do so as we still have plenty of space. As well as the conference itself we will have plenty of time to mix with the speakers and other participants, including a casual networking dinner at SZIMPLA restaurant near the venue. See further details below.
We are well into our new development cycle for the year, including our new templating system, new risk tool, risk matrix, and trial balance importer.
Nga mihi nui,
Clive and the AA team
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News & Technical Articles |
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Revisiting the basics of risk |
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We should never neglect the basics. And in modern auditing it doesn't get much more fundamental than understanding risk and our responses to it. We will be covering some of this in the conference, but the series of articles here is a great place to revisit the basics of risk from the key concepts of ISA 315 (revised 2019). Follow the link below to the articles and the video course that covers this. |
| Read More |
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Sharepoint integration video overview |
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This is now in general release. As we have noted, the value of this is not just that users will be able to link directly into their Sharepoint (or similar) storage, but that files accessed this way will be able to be edited seamlessly while still in Audit Assistant. A number of firms have requested more information on how this works so Nick has created a video run-through. Follow link. |
| Read More |
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Service Performance in review engagements |
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We have updated an article we prepared last year concerning a new proposed standard for service performance information in Reviews. The submission period closed and there seemed to be a general consensus that the standard was sensible. Brush up on the basics of this new standard. This will also be discussed at the conference. |
| Read More |
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Audit Assistant Conference |
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As you have probably heard we are hosting our first audit conference in Auckland next month (6th-7th). We have some great speakers and subjects lined up. We know the value of networking, only possible at live conferences, so we are making plenty of opportunities for interaction including a casual evening meal. We would love to see you there - but if you really can't make it in person we will have a live-streaming option. Follow the link for more information and to register.
While the conference is taking the place of our normal annual roadshow, we are still available for in-house training and new-user sessions. Contact us. |
| See full details and registration |
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Content Updates |
New templating system under development |
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As part of our V3 development we are currently streamlining our templating system. This will mean that for Historical Financial Audits (for example) there will be one "base template" that contains all the variations for all ISA -based Historical Financial Audits. Then individual templates for different job types will all branch from this, simplifying our present inheritance system. We are taking the opportunity to streamline our workflow and consolidate similar pages into one version. This will also allow our new risk response tool to be able to select specific testing pages (many in development) to address specific risks. We will be releasing more information over the next few months and at the conference. |
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Product Updates and Issue Resolutions |
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The new Audit Assistant Experience - update |
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Our new-look job interface incorporates all the old Audit Assistant, but the location is changed in some cases. These changes are designed to bring the design language into more unity with the rest of Audit Assistant and use more modern styles. We also address some of the clutter in the side-bar, which has evolved without redesign from our original 2009 version. Users can toggle between old and new views while getting used to the new styles. Follow the link for more details about how this looks and works - or just switch it on and go for it. Our plan is to have everyone switched over by the end of the financial year. |
| Read More |
Notification when a client opens a shared page |
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In December we added a notification when a client opens a shared page. This was requested by some users as a way of confirming that the client has received the share and is carrying out the work. A user has suggested that this results in too many notifications and wants to have the option to disable this. We will be developing options for notifications that provide the ability to switch on or off different types of notifications. If you have any feedback on this see the link below. |
| Read More |
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Prior columns on or off? |
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Jobs have 'prior 2' and 'prior 3' years in the trial balance, and in some analytical review pages but not in the lead schedules. You can show these columns if not showing or hide if not needed. |
| Find out more |
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Restrict auto share email? |
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Some firms prefer all emails to go out with their standard branding. The security option called Disable Client Emails stops emails being be sent to clients automatically from the system (for shares etc). |
| Find out more |
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IT department questions? |
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In larger firms the IT department or provider is often concerned with our IT security and privacy policy, and granting access through firewalls. This article tell you all you need to know. |
| Find out more |
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Have Your Say |
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Audit Assistant's feedback board allows users the ability to post suggestions for new content and new feature ideas. This now automatically records the name of the submitter, allowing more meaningful interaction. Please add your comments to existing suggestions and add new ideas. We feature a new suggestion each month: |
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Suggestions for the new version |
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We have had some good ideas and feedback on the new version. Please go here and add your comments and suggestions, or start a new entry for anything else you recommend or are having difficulty with. |
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