Revenue Audit
A practical starting point for assessing whether revenue is complete, accurate, authorised, collected promptly and recorded in the correct period.
What are we trying to establish?
Determine whether revenue is complete, accurate, authorised, collected promptly and recorded in the correct period.
Risks worth paying attention to
What should you request?
- Sales invoices and sales register
- Approved price lists and discount matrix
- Customer master data
- Delivery notes and proof of delivery
- Credit notes and returns
- Accounts receivable ageing
- Bank receipts and collection records
- Sales contracts and customer agreements
Understand the process before testing.
- Who initiates, reviews and approves transactions?
- Which duties should be separated?
- What system controls and approval limits apply?
- How are exceptions identified, approved and monitored?
- How does management know key controls actually operated?
Practical tests you can perform
Reconcile sales records to the general ledger
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Test invoice prices to approved price lists
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Trace invoices to delivery evidence
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Review sales cut-off around period end
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Analyse credit notes and sales returns
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Review overdue receivables and collections
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Test customer master changes and credit limits
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Search for duplicate or missing invoice sequences
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Things that should make you look deeper
- Transactions or activities outside normal patterns
- Missing or retrospective approvals
- Repeated exceptions without root-cause action
- Manual adjustments with weak supporting evidence
- Key controls dependent on one person
- Management reports that cannot be reconciled to source records
Questions that can open up the process
- What can go wrong in this process?
- Which controls are most important, and who performs them?
- Where does the process depend heavily on manual intervention?
- Which exceptions occur most often, and why?
- What information does management use to know the process is working?
Need a more detailed checklist?
Steal My Checklist contains ready-to-use audit procedures designed to help you structure fieldwork across key business areas.
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