With the ever-increasing level of transparency required by clients, audits are becoming commonplace and have the potential to throw the entire agency into a tailspin of panic, anxiety and frustration for weeks or even months at a time.

Audits are designed to ensure agencies are operating properly with the necessary controls in place to protect client data and details and are complying with the terms of their agreements, but an audit can have the opposite effect on agencies. It can throw operations into chaos as employees are pulled off billable work to chase down old correspondence, reconstruct timelines or forage for unsigned documents that place the agency at risk of missing important client deadlines, stretching employee bandwidth too far and violating SOW terms.

“We’ve gone through at least four audits every year,” said a CFO a large agency.

For many agencies, it’s not a question of whether an audit is coming, it’s a question of when. Every agency of any significant size will eventually be audited, either at the request (or demand) of a client or as one of the due diligence steps triggered by an investment or acquisition.

And using bookkeeping software alone won’t provide the features needed to easily provide essential reports and documentation.

It doesn’t have to be a painful process though. With integrated accounting software, accessing the data out and having it ready takes a fraction of the time.

Documents like purchase orders, estimates and AP invoices can be electronically signed and stored with the related records for easy lookup during an audit, and the workflow communications system ensures that every action and decision is tracked and searchable forever. Comments in a string of events cannot be modified or falsified.

These are just a few of the features that make going through an audit with integrated accounting software vs. bookkeeping software a very different experience.

One of the toughest aspects of an audit is collecting information across the agency. If accounting software is fully integrated with project management and media, research on financial transactions is seamless.

Let’s face it, going through an audit may never be your favorite thing, but at least with automated integrated accounting software, it doesn’t have to be a nightmare.

Our workflow automation software is an all-in-one solution purpose-built for agencies and creative teams of all sizes.

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