All businesses are audited on a regular basis, be it annually, monthly or in a spot check by a regulatory body or when head office is interested in exactly what has been happening at a regional store or factory. It’s a fact of life for business and because of that, it’s a good idea to have appropriate audit compliance software that can help make the audit process as simple and painless as possible.
As with many things, before you can select the right audit compliance software, you’ll need to assess exactly what needs to be audited, how often and what rewards can be reaped from it. For each business, the ‘what needs to be audited’ can differ widely. But, when it comes to the potential rewards available from regular, or even constant and transparent audits, there are a few that are universal:
- Satisfying regulatory requirements.
- Reassuring head office no wrongdoing has occurred.
- Understanding where a mistake has been made.
- Following a change in performance and pinpointing where it started.
- Helping to improve your business by understanding what works.
- Finding a particular problem and putting an end to it.
Satisfy regulators with the right audit compliance software
Regular audits and regulatory requirements are two things that are not going to go away. With this in mind, it’s imperative that businesses across all sectors are able to easily provide independent bodies the information they need.
While for some firms, working with older systems and software still works, if they were to look a little deeper and discuss audits with the staff, they may find they’re actually quite mistaken. With so much automation available to measure and track a business’s actions and performance, the time it takes to complete a physical audit is something few firms can really afford. Particularly if an audit is required more than once a year – which for many industries and companies it is.
Searching for the right audit compliance software can be a tough job, as there are many different options on offer. However, each business’s requirements are different, which suggests there is an option that would prove better than the others and meet the majority of a firm’s needs.
Once you have installed and are well trained on the right audit compliance software for your firm, however, it will be easier to satisfy the regulators with a simpler and completely transparent audit process.
Go further with the right software
Working to fulfill your regulatory requirements is an important part of running a business. But, improving a company’s operations and fulfilling a drive for growth and higher profits is key too and with the right software, this can also be achieved.
The dictionary definition of ‘audit’ is: ‘an official inspection of an organization’s accounts, typically by an independent body.’ But, the information that a regulator needs can also be analyzed by the firm itself to find and understand a multitude of information that can help with future growth.
As outlined above, an audit can be conducted to sift through and analyze data to help pinpoint when and where something changed, stopped working or became more popular. By identifying exactly what the catalyst for a specific change was, a business can use that information to stop the problem or try and replicate the improvement elsewhere.
This is when an audit – done swiftly and relatively painlessly with the right audit compliance software – can make your business a good one in the eyes of the regulators and also help the board that runs it. Of course, by its very nature, audit compliance software is there to focus on the compliance of your firm to official regulations. However, that information can be used in many different ways to achieve a number of desirable outcomes. This shows that having the right audit compliance software is an investment worth making for any business in any industry.
People are important too
Being advised of the right software for your company’s needs is something that can be done electronically, but better results are likely when the right people discuss and assess the decision. Moving forward from that, the best results from the software can be achieved with the right software when the best and most knowledgeable people in that industry and software are employed.
Having the right compliance and audit staff who are trained correctly with regular contact and refresher training on the software and its capabilities, are two essential details when it comes to getting the best from your audit compliance software.
Having the right software to monitor and assess all the data that comes from your business is an important tool. However, so is having the right staff to help understand the data. While software can easily pinpoint a change or pattern, it tends to take a person to understand what the pattern can mean in terms of fraud, for example.
As you can see from this, not only can the right people make the regulatory compliance inspections easier for the regulator, they can also help identify the potential motives behind a pattern or change. In addition, the right staff can help improve the business, either through detecting a new form of wrongdoing or identifying a reason for improvement from the analysis conducted by the audit compliance software.
Software doesn’t just make audits quicker
The best audit compliance software helps to speed the audit process up, both for the business and for the regulator. But that’s not its only benefit.
As well as measuring a set of results or raw data, against a set of particular standards as agreed and set by the independent body, it can measure that same data against you own chosen set of details. That means you can set your own set of rules, dependant on your business needs and – if you have the right software – you can expect to have real-time responses from the software. This is useful in any number of ways and is another way of continuously working to improve your business.
One example is stock keeping. If there are particular stock items you always need to have in your stores, then the software can monitor numbers in real time. When it sees the stock levels of that item are getting low or hit a level you’ve pre-determined as the time to order more, it can set up that order form and have it sent to you for approval.
Or, with regards to safety procedures, the right software can monitor and assess entrances onto particular buildings. If the wrong type of pass is used, then the audit compliance software can immediately send a notification to the relevant parties of what has happened. The people who receive the notification can then action it accordingly.
As you can see, the right audit compliance software, combined with the right people to operate and work with it, can help speed up a lot of company processes. This helps ensure a business can reap the benefits of a new finding on a broader level more quickly. It also means that when things go wrong, they can be stopped more quickly, thus limiting the extent of any damage caused by it.
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