ACCOUNTING & AUDIT SERVICES
JOHN FOWLER

“I did not value our annual audit until we appointed Watsons. They highlighted a serious flaw in our delivery procedures and its resultant losses over the years. With their help, we tightened our controls to ensure it did not reoccur and recovered money for the supply of goods that had gone unnoticed.”

 - John Fowler, Finance Director

Client Industry 
Manufacturing engineers

Location
Sussex

Background
The company had been with the same small accountancy firm for many years and felt that it needed to improve the audit services it was receiving and get more from our annual visit.

Problem
No advice was being offered on the client’s accounting systems or control procedures and there was a lack of confidence that existing advisers could provide that advice. In short, the company wanted to start afresh and see if a new company could provide the input they were looking for – although there was a degree of scepticism from the client.

Watson's Solution
To approach the audit assignment with our usual enthusiasm and advanced planning to ensure that we could report on any areas we felt needed improvement or suffered from control irregularities. This approach and testing uncovered potential weaknesses in the client’s dispatch procedures which, from further testing, proved to have led to substantial losses.

Result
Many issues were uncovered by the first audit Watsons performed, most of a compliance nature, to prevent potential future problems. But the dispatch findings were significant and resulted in a substantial collection of monies for goods supplied where no invoices had been raised.

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