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Consultants outline forensic, audit and advisory options as Suffolk school board weighs next steps
Summary
Cherry Bekaert, an accounting and forensics firm, presented a menu of oversight options — advisory internal control reviews, audits, assurance and forensic accounting — to the Suffolk Public Schools board at a June 12 work session, and board members debated whether to commission a targeted forensic review of purchase-card and accounts-payable activity.
Cherry Bekaert, an accounting and forensics firm, presented a set of financial oversight options to the Suffolk Public Schools board at a June 12 work session, laying out distinctions among advisory internal-control reviews, traditional audits, assurance engagements and forensic accounting investigations.
The presentation, led by Brandy Westbrook and John Collier of Cherry Bekaert, described advisory work as consultative efforts to identify internal-control gaps and recommend implementation support; audits as procedures aimed at expressing confidence in financial reports; assurance as an independent check on audits; and forensic accounting as a targeted, investigative engagement designed to identify and quantify suspected fraud or misuse of assets.
The board heard examples from Collier of past forensic engagements that examined payroll and accounts-payable processes at a…
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