Three questions an inspector could ask about your confirmations
2 minute read
Picture an inspector pulling one confirmation from two years ago. They ask three questions:
- How do you know this response came from who it says it did?
- When was the request sent, when was it opened, and who followed up?
- Which AS 2310 requirements did this one meet, and where’s the proof?
If you can answer all three in a minute, nice work. If you're already wondering which inbox to dig through, keep reading.
AS 2310 applies to every confirmation you send. And when the SEC took action against BF Borgers in 2024, the findings included gaps in audit procedures, documentation, and verification. Those are the same areas an inspector will look at in your process.
Each of those three questions points to a different weak spot, and most firms have at least one. Our white paper, Building a PCAOB AS 2310-Compliant Audit Confirmation Workflow, takes them one at a time. You’ll see what regulators expect, why paper and email processes tend to fall short, and what a defensible setup looks like.
There's a bonus, too. The same changes that make a workflow easier to defend also make it faster. In Forrester's Total Economic Impact study of Confirmation, electronic confirmations cut confirmation-related workload by 60-70% in busy season. One firm got back more than 18 days of billable hours.
Ten pages, and you’ll know exactly where to look.