Accounting Audit Trails

During Live Operations, the Transaction Processing, Checks Processing, File Maintenance, and Reports and Inquiry menus provide functions used during day-to-day operation of the system.

To process transactions, a three-step procedure is followed: (1) transaction entry; (2) journal printing; and (3) transaction posting, where records are integrated with permanent master files.

Transaction Entry

Entry of data occurs in groups, or batches, called “Control Groups”, which you should review prior to posting them to your master files. These groups are identified by user ID and “control number”, which allows each operator to process transactions separately from other operators. The system performs validation checks on all transactions entered. Accounts Payable may also receive customer refund information from Accounts Receivable, employee costs from Payroll, purchasing data from Purchase Orders and compensation figures from Commission Accounting.

Journal Printing

After transaction entry, each control group must be printed on a journal before it can be posted. The journals should be reviewed or edited by the operator, or someone else in the department who can verify the entered data. Save the journals; they are an important part of your audit trail.

During journal printing, the system performs validation checks, such as verifying in-balance amounts and checking referenced master files, on the data to ensure that the entered data can be posted correctly. Errors and warnings may be printed on the journal and summarized at the end of the journal. A control group that prints with errors will not be allowed to post until the errors are corrected and the journal is reprinted without errors. Journal printing also produces a “journal summary” which details the total dollar amount to be posted to each General Ledger account.

This process ensures that data is verified twice prior to being posted to permanent master files, and gives added assurance that erroneously entered data will not be posted.

Transaction Posting

Once transactions have been entered and the journal has been printed without error, the control group is ready to be posted to your master files. This process usually involves adding records to one or more system-maintained detail files, and summarizing the detail for historical records. Each transaction is deleted after it has been posted.

In Accounts Payable, the detail files are Month-to-Date Postings, Outstanding Checks, Transactions, and Unpaid Invoices; the historical records are the Vendor History, Processed Invoices, and Transaction History files.

Modification Logs

In all APPX applications optional Modification Logs may be enabled to provide an additional degree of audit control over who makes changes to master files, and when such changes are made. When a modification log name is supplied to a file maintenance function, a record of all additions, deletions, and changes to that file is supplied to a print file. When additions to a file are made, all new field contents are shown; when deletions are done, the key value and all field contents are recorded; when changes are done, the key value and all field contents are recorded; when changes are made, old field contents and new field contents are shown. In all cases, the user ID of the individual who performed the maintenance is printed, along with the date and time of the change.

Examples of master files in Accounts Payable are Vendors, Terms, Vendor Types, Descriptions, and Recurring Payments. Modification logs are not enabled for transaction files such as invoices, Adjustments, or Cash Disbursements.