How Internal Auditors can win The War against Spreadsheet Fraud

To prevent another round of million dollar scandals due to fraudulent manipulations on spreadsheets, regulatory bodies have launched major offensives against these well-loved User Developed Applications (UDAs). Naturally, internal auditors are front and center in carrying out these offensives.

While regulations like the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Dodd-Frank Act, and Solvency II can only be effective if end users are able to carry out the activities and practices required of them, auditors need to ascertain that they have. Sad to say, when it comes to spreadsheets, that is easier said than done.

Because spreadsheets are loosely distributed by nature, internal auditors always find it hard to: locate them, identify ownership, and trace their relationships with other spreadsheets. Now, we’re still talking about naturally occurring spreadsheets. How much more with files that have been deliberately tampered?

Spreadsheets can be altered in a variety of ways, especially if the purpose is to conceal fraudulent activities. Fraudsters can, for instance:

hide columns or rows,
perform conditional formatting, which changes the appearance of cells depending on certain values
replace cell entries with false values either through direct input or by linking to other spreadsheet sources
apply small, incremental changes in multiple cells or even spreadsheets to avoid detection
design macros and user defined functions to carry out fraudulent manipulations automatically

Recognising the seemingly insurmountable task ahead, the Institute of Internal Auditors released a guide designed specifically for the task of auditing user-developed applications, which of course includes spreadsheets.

But is this really the weapon internal auditors should be wielding in their quest to bring down spreadsheet fraud? Our answer is no. In fact, we believe no such weapon has to be wielded at all?because the only way to get rid of spreadsheet fraud is to eliminate spreadsheets once and for all.

Imagine how easy it would be for internal auditors to conduct their audits if data were kept in a centralised server instead of being scattered throughout the organisation in end-user hard drives.

And that’s not all. Because a server-based solution can be configured to have its own built-in controls, all your data will be under lock and key; unlike spreadsheet-based systems wherein storing a spreadsheet file inside a password-protected workstation does not guarantee equal security for all the other spreadsheets scattered throughout your company.

Learn more about Denizon’s server application solutions and discover a more efficient way for your internal auditors to carry out their jobs.

More Spreadsheet Blogs

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Top 10 Disadvantages of Spreadsheets

Disadvantages of Spreadsheets – obstacles to compliance in the Healthcare Industry

How Internal Auditors can win the War against Spreadsheet Fraud

Spreadsheet Reporting – No Room in your company in an age of Business Intelligence

Still looking for a Way to Consolidate Excel Spreadsheets?

Disadvantages of Spreadsheets

Spreadsheet woes – ill equipped for an Agile Business Environment

Spreadsheet Fraud

Spreadsheet Woes – Limited features for easy adoption of a control framework

Spreadsheet woes – Burden in SOX Compliance and other Regulations

Spreadsheet Risk Issues

Server Application Solutions – Don’t let Spreadsheets hold your Business back

Why Spreadsheets can send the pillars of Solvency II crashing down

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Symbion Pharmacy Services? Definition of Responsibility

A ?symbion? is an organism in a symbiotic (i.e. mutually beneficial) relationship with another one. In the case of Australia?s giant Symbion Pharmacy Services, this means supplying and delivering over-counter Chemmart medicines to more than 3,000 hospital and retail pharmacies, while remaining mindful of its carbon footprint.

In 1999, the company with the tagline ?life matters? and a desire to be seen as ?a good corporate citizen? decided it was time to measure exactly what it was pumping out from 12 facilities and over 200 vehicles. This was a voluntary decision as even now there is still no carbon emissions law in Australia (although no doubt being a ?first mover? will put the company in a competitive position when this inevitably comes).

Symbion decided to install emission detection devices and connect these to a central monitoring system with the intention of managing what these measured. There were two stages to this process. First, Symbion determined its reporting requirements based on one of its larger warehouses. Following that, it established a carbon footprint for each of its wholly owned and managed facilities. This put it in a position to:

Analyse total emissions down to a level of detail where it understood the contribution of each source
Use big data management tools to identify carbon hotspots for priority remedial action
Inform the affected workforce, explain the monitoring system and keep them in the loop
Separately manage energy abatement programs such as lighting and delivery routes

The program also had productivity spin-offs in that it focused management attention on the processes behind the emissions that were ripe for material and system improvements. It also provided marketing leverage. Symbion?s customers are in the wellness business, ahead of the curve when it comes to how emissions contribute to chronic illness, and aware of the cost of this in terms of human capital.

EcoVaro could help you manage your throughputs by analysing your data on our cloud-based system. This includes trending your metrics, comparing them to your industry seasonal average, and providing you with a business-like view of how well you are doing.

Our service reduces your reliance on (and the cost of) third party audits, and simplifies the reporting process to your controlling authority. It simply makes more sense to contract your software out this way, and only pay for it when you need it.

Web Design and Development

The first few seconds of a first-time website visitor is very crucial. If they don’t like what they see or if they think it takes too long just to load what they’re supposed to see, chances are, that would be the last time you’d ever catch them on your site.

Therefore, striking a balance between your website’s appearance and its loading speed is important for first impressions. Once you’ve captured the visitor’s attention, the next objective is to keep them glued long enough for them to browse through your merchandise. It is at this point that the benefits of a well organised and highly intuitive graphical user interface come into play.

An excellent combination of stylish web design and sharp web development can play a major role in lowering bounce rates and increasing returning visitors. We see to it that our web designers and developers not only excel at what they do individually, but also understand the interplay between their individual creations and how it affects the overall appeal of the website.

This is what you can expect from our brand of web design and development:

Conversion-motivated web design. Since we understand that your primary motivation for entering into the eCommerce arena is to turn torrential web traffic into sales, we’ve put conversion as a primary consideration in our web designs.
SEO-friendly content. First-time visitors don’t reach your site because they entered your URL somewhere. Rather, they must have stumbled upon your links on search engine results or on other websites.
Engaging web content. Because excellent graphics alone can’t sell products but engaging web content can, we invest in excellent copywriters.
Visitor-friendly user interface. Before a visitor will ever read content on the current and succeeding pages, they’ll need to interact with your site’s UI first. We’ll make sure your user interface is visually appealing enough to invite visitors to click on your buttons.
Superior expertise in web development technologies. Our web developers are certified experts in web related technologies including Javascript, AJAX, SQL, PHP, CSS, Java, Silverlight, CMSes, and Magento, among others. Thus, we can offer extreme flexibility and scalability in our web development services.

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2015 ESOS Guidelines Chapter 2 – Deadlines and Status Changes

The ESOS process is deadline driven and meeting key dates is a non-negotiable. The penalties for not complying / providing false or misleading information are ?50,000 each. Simply not maintaining adequate records could cost you ?5,000. The carrot on the end of the stick is the financial benefits you stand to gain.

Qualifying for inclusion under the ESOS umbrella depends on the status of your company in terms of employee numbers, turnover and balance sheet on 31 December 2014. Regardless of whether you meet the 2014 threshold or not, you must reconsider your situation on 31 December 2018, 2022 and 2026.

Compliance Period	Qualification Date	Compliance Period	Compliance Date
1	31 December 2014	From 17 July 2014* to 5 December 2015	5 December 2015
2	31 December 2018	From 6 December 2015 to 5 December 2019	5 December 2019
3	31 December 2022	From 6 December 2019 to 5 December 2023	5 December 2023
4	31 December 2026	From 6 December 2023 to 5 December 2027	5 December 2027

Notes:

1. The first compliance period begins on the date the regulations became effective

2. Energy audits from 6 December 2011 onward may go towards the first compliance report

Changes in Organisation Status

If your organisation status changes after a qualification date when you met compliance thresholds, you are still bound to complete your ESOS assessment for that compliance period. This is regardless of any change in size or structure. Your qualification status then remains in force until the next qualification date when you must reconsider it.