What procedures can be adopted by the auditor to detect unrecorded liabilities during an audit of the purchasing process?

Liability is defined in Conceptual Framework of International Financial Reporting Standards as “a present obligation of the entity arising from past events, the settlement of which is expected to result in an outflow from the entity of resources embodying economic benefits”.

There can be many instances where management will be prone to not record a liability due to various reasons. The management may not record a current liability to improve its current ratio and present its liquidity position higher. Management may also skip to record a long term liability at year end to improver it debt to equity ratio. A high current ratio and low debt to equity ratio makes it easy for the management to obtain new financing for the company.

Auditor should verify the unrecorded liability by applying the following procedures:

• Vouch a sample of cash disbursements recorded just after year end to receiving reports and vendor invoices. In a voucher system, a voucher is not prepared until the requisition, receiving report, and sellers invoice are reconciled with the purchase order.  Auditors search open files for unmatched documents.
• In searching for unrecorded payables, the auditor would look at disbursements made after year end to see if they should have been, and were, properly recorded as payables at year end.
• Tracing a sample of purchase orders and the related receiving reports to the purchases journal and the cash disbursements journal will enable the auditor to determine that the purchases were properly recorded.
• Analytical procedures.  Accounts payable turnover is very important.   Unusual relations should be investigated.
• Cash disbursements cutoff test.  Test if cash disbursement and accounts payable reduction are reconcilable. Inspect the last checque written and trace it to the accounts payable subsidiary ledger. Reviewing subsequent cash disbursements enables the auditor to detect items purchased before year end but not yet recorded, i.e., unrecorded accounts payable.
• Purchases cutoff test tests to determine if goods for which title has passed or not passed are appropriately accounted for. FOB shipping point and FOB destination are critical to this test.
• Trace subsequent payments to recorded payables.  Match checques issued subsequent to year end with the related payable.  Checque should be issued only for payables that existed on the balance sheet at year end.  Any checque that cannot be matched may represent an unrecorded liability at year end.
• If confirmations are used, small and zero balances should be sampled as well as large balances.  For example, if orders are placed with a vendor on a consistent basis, a confirmation should be sent to the vendor regardless of the balance due at year end.

Practice

The auditor should check for all the audit assertions while verifying unrecorded liabilities. Valuation assertion will verify whether accounts payable are valued in accord with GAAP/IFRS? Presentation/Disclosure assertion will verify whether the accounts liability balances are properly presented and disclosed? Accounts payable should be listed as a current liability.  Purchases should be listed in the calculation of cost of goods sold. Unusual transactions involving accounts payable should be disclosed, such as related party transactions involving accounts payable. Obtain a management representation letter with assertions relating to accounts payable and purchases.