Sales Audit
A practical starting point for assessing whether sales activities, pricing, customer management and order fulfilment are properly authorised and support profitable, sustainable revenue.
What are we trying to establish?
Determine whether sales activities, pricing, customer management and order fulfilment are properly authorised and support profitable, sustainable revenue.
Risks worth paying attention to
What should you request?
- Sales policy and approved price lists
- Sales targets and actual sales reports
- Customer master and credit limits
- Sales orders and invoices
- Delivery and proof-of-delivery records
- Discount and rebate approvals
- Sales returns and complaints
- Salesperson performance reports
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
Compare targets with actual sales by customer and product
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Test prices and discounts to approvals
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Review customer credit limits and overrides
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Trace sales orders through delivery and invoicing
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Analyse cancellations, returns and complaints
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Review inactive and duplicate customer accounts
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Analyse margin by product and customer
Obtain appropriate evidence, investigate exceptions and document your conclusion.
Review unusual end-of-period sales patterns
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.
Get Steal My Checklist