When you get the news that your business is undergoing an audit, it’s easy to quickly become overwhelmed with everything that needs to be done. Records need to be compiled, employees need to be prepped, and you need to exude confidence even if you’re worried about the audit’s outcome.

If you run a small enough business that you handle all of your own accounting on top of the day-to-day running of a business, it can be tough to figure out how you’ll be able to manage the audit on top of it all. Luckily, when it comes to affordable business audit preparation, Global Shared Services is here to help.

To get started, go through this checklist and ensure that everything’s in order before the audit starts.

Map Out Your Financial Goals

What are your short-term goals? Long-term goals?

Before the audit starts, ensure that you have set goals for your business financials. Know where you’d like to be in five, ten, twenty years – and how you’ll get there. An audit is focused on providing stakeholders with an objective independent examination of the financial status of an organization. Your ability to reasonably set and accomplish short-term and long-term goals can have a big impact on that. If you’ve promised your stakeholders one thing, but the audit shows that your finances won’t be able to make that happen, then you could have a problem.

Compile All Financial Records

This step can either be extremely easy or very complicated, depending on how well you’ve kept track of your financial records up until this point. Do you keep all of your bank statements? Expense sheets? Are they all appropriately formatted, dated, and easy to work with?

When it comes to affordable business audit preparation, an established relationship with an accounting firm will help. They’ll have kept track of all of your records, statements, and important financial documents in the appropriate format. If you haven’t already started working with a business accounting firm, you can work with Global Shared Services’ affordable business audit preparation services to help your company get organized in preparation for the coming months ahead. As an established leader in the accounting industry, we know what types of documents are required for the average audit.

Reconcile All Accounts

Now’s the time to reconcile all of your accounts. Your statements, expense sheets, and other records need to be correct. If you, like many other business owners, have been too busy to reconcile your statements on a monthly basis, then this could be a problem. As part of our affordable business audit preparation, we can help you reconcile your accounts and flag any issues that may appear.

Keep in mind that reconciliation doesn’t just include your bank statements. You also need to provide records of any rent payments, employee paid time off, and other tracked expenses. All of your business operational expenses should be recorded and categorized appropriately. If errors are noticed, then they could cause more problems later on.

It’s important to resolve any financial issues before the audit starts to avoid wasting time making corrections. An audit can be very disruptive to your office and business operations. You want to make it easy for the auditors to do their job so they can move on faster. Reconciling all accounts is a great place to start.

Prepare Your Staff

When most business owners hear the phrase “business audit,” a chill can easily come over them. Business audits are disruptive, and the results can have a big impact on the future of your company. Your employees will understand this as well and could be experiencing the same apprehension.

To avoid the negative impacts of apprehension or worry in your office, it’s important to discuss the oncoming business audit with your employees. Discuss what processes are in place to create the least amount of disruption to their workday. While the auditors are working, it’s often helpful to appoint one staff member as their official liaison to avoid pointless interruptions to other employees throughout the day.

You can also soothe employee worries by discussing possible outcomes of the audit, how it would impact the company, and focusing on positive outcomes. If you’re receiving affordable business audit preparation help, you can discuss your understanding of possible audit outcomes with GSS. The better you understand what could happen, the more you’ll be able to answer your employees’ questions.

Bring Your Processes Up-to-Date

Your auditors will be aware of the latest updates to financial regulations and policies. It’s a good idea to make sure that all of the ways you handle financial information is up to code and in compliance with various regulations before the audit begins. If it turns out that you’re handling secure information in an unsecure way, you could face serious consequences.

One of the benefits of using affordable business audit preparation is working with someone who has expertise in the latest regulations and any changes to financial requirements.

Your accounting firm will be able to guide you in regard to what needs updating, the appropriate way to handle your information, and what you can leave alone.

Affordable business audit preparation can be a huge relief to business owners going through an audit. The presence of auditors in your company can be very stressful and overwhelming. Don’t go through it alone. When you have the expertise and experience of Global Shared Services on your side, you’ll have someone to make the process bearable.

We offer all of the accounting and financial services you need to get your business ready for an audit. We focus on franchise accounting and restaurant accounting. If you’re looking for statement processing, reconciliations, and more, then get in touch with us today.

If you’re ready to prepare for an audit of your business, let’s talk.