Backbone was engaged by an SMP firm to address inefficiencies in preparing audit working papers. Routine tasks such as cleansing client-provided data, preparing lead schedules, populating audit work steps, and generating samples were taking about one man-hour at the start of each engagement. These tasks, while necessary, did not require professional judgement from the auditors and were primarily mechanical.
Backbone evaluated the firm’s audit process and custom-designed an Excel tool based on the firm’s internal audit procedures to automate the preparation of the working papers and generate the applicable work steps.
What previously took an hour to complete is now done in seconds, greatly improving efficiency and freeing up auditors for more critical tasks.
