Assurance

Our services provide independent and professional opinions
that reduce information risk (risk that comes from incorrect information). 

 
  • Assurance is an engagement in which an accountant issues a report or statement designed to enhance the degree of confidence of third parties and management by the enhancing or production of information. Our services provide independent and professional opinions that reduce information risk (risk that comes from incorrect information). An audit is the systematic examination of the assertions or actions of a 3rd party to evaluate conformance to some norm.  Financial audits are assurance concerning the  reliability of financial statements.  Other audits may have a variety of subject matter.
  • The level of service is determined by your needs as the client, and what your creditors and / or investors require.  
  • Financial Statement (or a component thereof) (historical or forecast) products:
    • Compiled (lowest level of assurance)
    • Reviewed (medium level of assurance)
    • Audited (highest level of assurance)
  • Other non-financial statement subject matter products:
    • Review Assurance - The subject matter is varied and defined by the client and the assurance level is moderate.
    • Examination - The subject matter is varied and defined by the client and the assurance level is high.
    • Comfort Letters – Typically a request by our client for us to send a letter to their mortgage underwriter with some assurance about the client.
    • Agreed Upon Procedures – we perform specific procedures for the client and report on the results and no assurance is given.
    • PTA-Audit - PTAs must complete what they call an annual audit.  This is an agreed upon procedure engagement that performs the procedures required annually by the Georgia PTA.
    • Internal Audit Procedures -  independent, objective assurance and consulting activity designed to add value and improve an organization's operations.
    • Monitoring Visit - points out flaws or noncompliance. We also help fix the flaws or non-compliance.
  • Price
    • The higher the level of service required, the more time the CPA needs to complete the engagement and therefore the more costly the engagement. Other things which make the price of an assurance service rise are the breadth of the subject matter, the complexity of the criteria, and whether the assurance provider follows audit standards.
    • If the subject matter is large or broad, it will take a small army of assurance providers a long time to reach their conclusions. 
    • If the audit criteria is vague or complex or highly specialized, the assurance provider will need specific skills and the rarer those skills are, the higher the price.
    • We follow audit standards as required so it costs more for the auditor to earn and maintain the necessary credentials, maintain convincing documentation, ensure audit quality, and undergo external reviews of audit quality.
    • In general, it costs more for an auditor to provide a higher level of assurance, so an audit will cost more than a “‘review” of the same subject matter. For example, a church has an audit done every two years of its financial statements by a local CPA firm. This audit costs $15,000. In the off two year period, the church hires the same CPA firm to do a ”review” of its revenues and disbursements and this costs only $6,000.