If you have to prepare year end accounts from incomplete records do you add any paragraphs into the approval statement, to indicate the fact that the figures are derived from incomplete data?
I am working from poorly kept Sage data for 2009/10, where 2008/09 had not been closed off properly and no year end adjustments were made from the accountants figures, so it runs from 2008 through to 2010.
There is also the small matter of blank cheque book stubs, spurious drawings and ambiguous expenses.
The best that can be done is to run various reports for 2009/10 and collate the data from that. The problem is, that there is no guarantee that the previous bookkeeper has made correct postings (I wont rant on about the quality of her work - did that in another post already) and my remit (and fee!!) does not include any internal audit. To be honest, if it did I would start again!!
I have not heard of any clause that says where the records come from, just that they are unaudited and the client agrees with them. I think so long as you follow the guidelines for incomplete records, you should be fine - after all, who is to say the information given in a good set is true and accurate, without an extensive audit??
I used to do incomplete records all the time and viewed them no differently to a full set bar the workings needed to be done to come to a final figure.
I see a set of accounts as the final product - how you get there is not the issue, so long as it reflects a true picture of trade and liability.
