Attorneys: audit report template
Important news for the current reporting period
SAICA has issued a very important communication regarding the audit report template to be used for attorneys trust accounts for the current year. SAICA’s communication on the transitional arrangement relating to the Legal Practice Act and Legal Practice Council Rules is available on the SAICA website.
How is this different from previous communications?
In the LEAF Webinar on Attorneys trust accounts and in the previous newsletter on the same topic, dual reporting was recommended because no transitional audit report templates were made available at that point in time.
However, the LPC has now finally issued an updated audit report template for the transitional period that auditors are faced with for the current year. The transitional arrangement resulted in a single audit report template that refers to both the old Attorneys Act and corresponding Rules and to the new Legal Practice Act and Legal Practice Council Rules.
This transitional period audit report template can be downloaded from the SAICA website:
https://www.saica.co.za/portals/0/documents/SAICA%20Communication%20Transitional%20arrangement%20LPA%20and%20LPC%20Rules.pdf
This comes as a relief for auditors, since the dual reporting format created an increased time burden and this can now be avoided by using this transitional audit report template.
Conclusion
Please ensure that you download the transitional period audit report template for immediate implementation on all of your attorneys trust account assurance engagements from the SAICA website. If you have any questions in this regard, you are welcome to contact LEAF for expert technical advice and practical guidance.
References
- SAICA: Reasonable assurance engagement on the compliance of the Attorneys’ Trust Account with the Attorneys Act, 53 of 1979 and the Rules for the Attorneys’ Profession, as well as the Legal Practice Act, 28 of 2014 and Legal Practice Council Rules, July 2019
Need help?
If you need advice, guidance, assistance or training, our experienced specialists at LEAF are ready to help your firm to push above and beyond the norm.