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MS Office Tools an Aid to SOX Compliance

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Using Microsoft Access/Excel to improve internal controls and accurate ... Allows employees to develop marketable skill. Increases awareness of data structure ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: MS Office Tools an Aid to SOX Compliance


1
MS Office Tools - an Aid to SOX Compliance
  • Presented by Sheri Evans, Manager, Fluor Hanford
    Disbursements Accounting

2
Agenda
  • Financial reporting
  • Using Microsoft Access/Excel to improve internal
    controls and accurate reporting
  • Expanding the use of MS Access within an
    organization
  • Additional benefits to using Access
  • Getting started in your organization
  • Questions

3
Financial Reporting
  • SOX requires accurate financial information and
    effective internal controls
  • How do you translate financial transactions into
    accurate financial reports?
  • Ensure transactions are accurate, timely and
    complete
  • Ensure business processes operate as designed and
    controls are working
  • Ensure transactions are reported accurately
  • Canned Reports vs. Ad Hoc Reports

4
Canned or System-Generated Reports
  • Do they meet your needs?
  • Circumstances unique to your company
  • Special requirements imposed by DCAA/DOE/Auditors
  • Do you understand the underlying assumptions upon
    which the report is based?
  • How do you know if a report is accurate?

5
Ad Hoc Reporting
  • Performed by anyone with access to the data and
    the tools needed to create a report
  • Can modify reports to focus on specific needs
  • Sources for ad hoc reporting
  • Specialized reporting software
  • Query capability within applications such as
    PeopleSoft
  • Microsoft Office tools such as Access

6
MS Office Tools and Internal Controls
  • Use of MS Excel and Access for continuous
    monitoring has been hailed as a Best Practice
    by Fraud Magazine
  • Well designed Access queries can validate not
    only your data, but your processes as well
  • Access queries can highlight trends before they
    become a problem

7
Using MS Access
  • Advantages to using Microsoft Access
  • Easy to learn
  • Data is accessible to many users
  • Access is flexible and can meet multiple users
    needs
  • In general, no additional costs for using Access
  • Disadvantages to using Microsoft Access
  • Are users sufficiently skilled to generate
    accurate reports?
  • Control of information can be difficult
  • Are users sufficiently knowledgeable to identify
    report weaknesses?

8
Using Access With Multiple Users
  • One to two people can write the query or report
  • Multiple people can run the query or report
  • Push the data down to as low a level as possible
  • Create Macros to allow multiple queries to be run
    at one time

9
What is a Macro
  • A macro is a series of queries, reports, or other
    actions carried out sequentially
  • Specific macros can be written for specific
    purposes. Examples
  • SOX Macro
  • Accounts Payable Macro
  • Payroll Macro
  • By enlisting the entire department in the review
    of the data, errors are found quickly

10
Beyond the Numbers
  • Training employees to use Access and Excel has
    other benefits
  • Allows employees to develop marketable skill
  • Increases awareness of data structure
  • Empowers each employee to take responsibility for
    accuracy
  • Strengthens the Internal Control culture

11
How to Get Started
  • Determine whether you need real-time data or can
    use back-up data
  • Determine how you will control access to the data
  • Have system personnel provide you with the ODBC
    instructions to connect to the data
  • Train one or two people to become the
    Access/Excel experts for your department
  • Create the queries or reports and validate the
    data

12
Wrap Up
  • Accurate financial information is critical to SOX
    compliance
  • Access allows you to verify that your controls
    are working and your data is accurate
  • Human error is natural the best controls catch
    the errors and allow corrective action to be
    taken before the SOX auditors knock on your door.
  • Questions?
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