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Audit and Assurance
Statutory audit services in Ghana
The annual audit, done to your deadline.
The independent opinion required before your financial statements can be issued, filed or circulated. Conducted under International Standards on Auditing by a partner who stays on the engagement from planning to signing.
Request an audit proposal All audit and assuranceA statutory audit is an independent opinion on whether your financial statements give a true and fair view. Under the Companies Act 2019 (Act 992), that opinion is required before accounts are issued, published or circulated, and it is the first document a bank, a regulator or an investor will ask to see.
What you receive
Three things. The audit report carrying our opinion, which goes to the Registrar, the Ghana Revenue Authority and anyone financing you. The financial statements as audited, under the framework that applies to you: where you prepare them we review them, and where you need them prepared that is the separate engagement described below. And a management letter setting out the control weaknesses we found and what to do about them.
The third is the one most boards file. It is usually the most useful document you receive all year, because it is the only place somebody independent tells you where money is leaking.
Do you actually need one?
A narrow exemption exists for qualifying small private companies, but it disappears the moment somebody with leverage asks for audited accounts: a lender reviewing a facility, a regulator, an investor conducting diligence, a donor releasing a tranche, or a tender requiring three years of accounts. Most companies that could claim exemption end up needing an audit anyway, and the ones that wait pay more for it.
What decides the timetable
Not our capacity. How quickly the schedules, bank confirmations and supporting documents arrive. A client with a reconciled trial balance and a fixed asset register that agrees to the ledger finishes in three weeks. A client assembling documents after we arrive takes twice as long. That is why we issue the request list at planning and hold a readiness call before fieldwork opens, and why we publish an audit readiness checklist you can work through before appointing anybody.
The statute requiring the audit and setting what is filed
Fieldwork to signed opinion, depending on size and complexity
Quoted in the proposal and held unless scope changes
Scope
What a statutory audit covers
Scoped to the risk in your business rather than to a standard checklist, though the deliverables are the same in every case.
Risk assessment and planning
We walk the business, identify where material misstatement could actually arise, set materiality and agree the fieldwork window. You receive the document request list at the end of this.
Substantive testing and confirmations
Testing on the balances that carry risk, third-party confirmations from banks and major counterparties, and stock attendance where inventory is material.
Financial statement review
Under IFRS or IFRS for SMEs, depending which applies. Where you prepare them, we review; where you need them prepared, that is a separate engagement with its own independence considerations.
Opinion, management letter and clearance
The signed opinion, plus findings ranked by financial exposure with a suggested owner and date against each, discussed with you rather than emailed.
Process
How the audit runs
Published so you can see where your team's time is needed and where it is not.
Acceptance and clearance
Independence checks and, where you are changing firms, professional clearance with the outgoing auditor once you have informed them.
About one weekPlanning
Risk assessment, materiality, document request list and an agreed fieldwork date.
Week 1Readiness call
Confirming documents exist and reconcile before anybody arrives on site.
Before fieldworkFieldwork
Testing, confirmations and stock attendance. Queries raised as they arise rather than saved to the end.
Two to six weeksPartner review and clearance
Subsequent events, going concern, and the meeting where anything affecting the opinion is raised. Never at signing.
One weekOpinion and management letter
Signed, issued and walked through with you.
On completionEngagement
Fees, timing and who does the work
Fee basis
Fixed, quoted in advanceSet on scope, complexity, risk and senior time.Who does the work
A partner and a managerNamed in the proposal and on the engagement from planning to signing.Timeline
Two to six weeksOf fieldwork. Partner review, clearance and signing follow it. Where the deadline is tight we add people rather than moving the date.Questions
Questions before you appoint
Does my company have to be audited in Ghana?
How long does it take?
What does it cost?
Can you audit us if another firm did last year?
Will the audit find fraud?
Next step
Send us last year's accounts and this year's deadline.
That is enough for a proposal. Scope, a named partner and manager, a timetable and a fixed fee back within one working day.
Also under Audit and Assurance
Internal audit, outsourced or co-sourced
An outsourced or co-sourced internal audit function reporting to your board or audit committee. Risk-based annual plan, fieldwork, and findings ranked by exposure with an owner and a date against each.
Forensic audit and investigations
Where fraud, misappropriation or a serious control failure is suspected. Evidence gathered and documented to a standard that holds up in a disciplinary process, an insurance claim or in court, and scoped so the investigation does not tip off the people it concerns.
NGO and donor-funded grant audits
Grant audits, expenditure verification and agreed-upon procedures for international NGOs, local implementing partners and donor-funded programmes operating in Ghana and the sub-region. Reported in the template your funder actually requires.