Services · Audit Support
Audit support through to the signing of the audit report
Audit support runs from planning through execution to completion, inside your own methodology and file structure.
Working papers, lead schedules, and testing documentation are prepared and reviewed by qualified professionals before your team runs its final check.
Saramis Global supports the engagement. Your engagement partner signs the audit report.
How the file moves
Three phases carry the audit file from open to sign-off
Planning, execution, completion: take one phase or all three. Each phase hands off to the next with a written status, and nothing moves forward until the previous phase clears.
Lean on this most during busy season.
Use it to prepare for a first statutory audit.
Sector is not a gate. Audit support runs across Retail, Manufacturing, Services, and Financial services (banking, insurance, mutual funds). Saramis Global is not tied to any one sector: the accounting and the auditing carry across, and the sector-specific risks get mapped at planning rather than assumed.
Planning
Planning sets the shape of the engagement before fieldwork opens. Risk areas get flagged early, and the strategy is fixed before a single working paper is touched.
- Audit Planning
- Risk Assessment
- Audit Strategy
Execution
Execution is where the file gets built, tested, and documented. Each working paper is indexed and cross-referenced to your lead schedules, in the layout your engagement partner already expects.
- Working Papers
- Lead Schedules
- Audit Testing
- Documentation
Completion
Completion carries the file to the point your engagement partner signs it. Open review notes close out first, then the file is archived in a format your firm can hand straight to its own quality reviewer.
- · Completion Procedures
- · Review Support
- · Support until the Audit Report is Signed
Built to your file, not a template
Working papers follow the numbering and cross-reference conventions your firm already uses, matched before fieldwork opens rather than renegotiated mid-file.
A file built to a different standard costs your reviewer time when your team has the least of it.
The team works in CaseWare, Inflo, DataSnipper, Bright Workpapers (renamed from MyWorkpapers), and Excel-based files. Running something else? Saramis Global trains its team on your platform, and your firm changes nothing.
Five elements matched to your methodology
- File indexing and cross-referencing follow your firm's own scheme
- Lead schedules keep the column layout your reviewer reads fastest
- Review-note logs mirror the format your methodology prescribes
- Archive structure returns exactly as your quality reviewer expects
- Audit software stays yours; the file is built inside your platform
Standards
International Standards on Auditing anchor how every file is built
Working papers are built to the International Standards on Auditing (ISA), with the national auditing standards of your jurisdiction layered on where they differ. Three ISAs shape the file most: ISA 200, ISA 315, and ISA 700. India's Standards on Auditing converge with the ISAs, so an SA-framework file and an ISA-framework file carry the same architecture. The financial statements the file tests come prepared under your own reporting framework: UK FRS 102 and FRS 102 Section 1A, US GAAP, IFRS, Indian GAAP, or Dutch GAAP. Name both on the discovery call and the file follows them from the first working paper.
ISA 200: overall objectives
ISA 200 sets the overall objectives of the independent auditor and the conduct of an audit, and India's SA 200 mirrors it. Every working paper is documented so your engagement partner meets those objectives from evidence inside the file, not from memory.
ISA 315: risk identification
ISA 315 covers identifying and assessing the risks of material misstatement, and SA 315 carries the same requirement in India. Planning support maps each flagged risk to the working paper that responds to it, so the risk assessment and the testing never drift apart.
ISA 700: forming the opinion
ISA 700 governs forming an opinion and reporting on financial statements, as SA 700 does in India. That step belongs to your engagement partner alone; completion documentation supports the conclusion your partner reaches, and Saramis Global never forms or expresses the opinion.
Independence, stated plainly
Saramis Global prepares and supports. It does not sign.
Audit-support providers sometimes blur this line. Saramis Global does not: independence is a structural fact of the engagement, not a caveat in the small print.
Saramis Global prepares and supports.
Your engagement partner signs the audit report.
Saramis Global never signs an audit report, never issues an opinion, and never contacts your audit client unless you agree to it in advance.
That boundary is what makes the working papers, testing, and review support Saramis Global delivers usable evidence for your file, not shadow work sitting outside it.
| Saramis Global always | Saramis Global never |
|---|---|
| Prepares working papers, lead schedules, and testing to your methodology | Signs an audit report or issues an audit opinion |
| Clears review notes and supports completion through to sign-off | Acts as the appointed statutory auditor |
| Works inside your file, under your engagement partner's direction | Contacts your audit client without your prior agreement |
| States this boundary in the engagement letter before the first working paper opens | Holds itself out as an audit firm in India, the UK, the US, or Australia |
The boundary is law before it is positioning
Saramis Global is an Indian private limited company. Under section 141 of India's Companies Act 2013, only a chartered accountant holding a certificate of practice is eligible for appointment as a statutory auditor, so a private limited company cannot perform statutory attest functions in any form.
Support to signature, never sign, is therefore a legal fact of the corporate form. No commercial negotiation moves it.
Individual professionals on the team hold their own memberships: Saramis Global runs a team of 9 Chartered Accountants, supported by MBA and BCom professionals, including part-qualified ACCA and CPA members. The firm itself is not an ICAI-registered audit practice and never presents itself as one.
How it works
Four steps from your file to a signed report
Handoff starts with the file you already have.
Your file arrives
Your methodology, templates, and existing working papers come to Saramis Global as they are. Nothing is migrated to a different framework first. A short intake call confirms scope, timing, and who owns which file section before anything is touched.
Calibration on the first file
The first file sets the working rhythm. Format, review points, and turnaround expectations are confirmed against your own methodology before the next file starts, not mid-fieldwork.
Fieldwork support
Working papers and testing move forward together, with lead schedules updated as each area closes. Review notes are cleared within 24 hours instead of piling up. Status updates go out on a fixed schedule, not only when something goes wrong.
Completion and archive
Completion procedures close the file. The archive returns in your own format, ready for your engagement partner's final review. A closing summary lists what changed, what remains open, and what the next engagement should carry forward.
Review notes clear within 24 hours
Review notes are the mechanism that keeps a file moving. Each note is logged against its working paper as fieldwork progresses, carries a visible status, and clears inside the window, so open points never stack up towards completion.
- Logged in the format your methodology prescribes, against the working paper it belongs to.
- Given a visible status you read in the same log your own reviewer would use, not a separate tracker.
- Cleared within 24 hours, so notes do not carry into the final week.
- Marked blocked with the reason named when it waits on client information, never left silent.
Worked example
One file, followed from planning to sign-off
Here is how a single statutory audit file moves through the four steps above, with the boundary visible at every stage. No client is named; the mechanics are the same on every engagement.
- 1
Planning: the boundary enters the engagement letter
The engagement letter records the boundary before any working paper opens: your firm is the appointed auditor, Saramis Global is the support team. Planning support then drafts the risk assessment under ISA 315 and maps each flagged risk, such as revenue cut-off, to the working paper that tests it.
- 2
Fieldwork: working papers build in your indexing scheme
Working papers and lead schedules build out inside your own audit platform. The receivables working paper is cross-referenced to its lead schedule and to the risk it answers, in the layout your reviewer already reads.
- 3
Review notes: logged, visible, cleared inside the window
Your reviewer raises a note against the receivables paper: one debtor confirmation is missing from the circularisation sample. The note enters the log your methodology prescribes, carries a visible status, and clears within 24 hours. A note that waits on client information is marked blocked with the reason named, never left silent.
- 4
Sign-off: your engagement partner signs the audit report
Completion procedures close the file: subsequent-events review, going-concern documentation, and the final analytical review. The archive returns in your firm's own structure. Your engagement partner reads the completed file and signs the audit report; Saramis Global's name appears nowhere on the opinion.
What goes wrong elsewhere
Three points where audit files usually stall
Most delays trace back to one of three points, not a shortage of hours.
Working papers in the wrong format
A file arrives in a format your reviewer has never seen. Saramis Global builds inside your existing template and numbering from the first file, so nothing needs re-formatting before review.
Review notes that never close
A note gets raised and sits open until someone chases it. Notes are logged, tracked, and cleared within 24 hours, with a status your reviewer can see directly.
A contact who goes quiet mid-fieldwork
One point of contact stays assigned for the length of the engagement, from planning through the final review note, so a question never waits on a handover.
Busy season
Overflow capacity when audit season peaks
Audit season concentrates demand into a handful of weeks each year. Saramis Global adds capacity for that peak, then steps back once it passes.
For Accounting Firms, that overflow support runs against your own review notes and sign-off timetable, not a separate one. Firms that also hand over the books pair it with Bookkeeping & Accounting so the ledger feeding the file is already reconciled.
The most common failure mode during peak weeks is a backlog of unresolved review notes stacking up against the sign-off deadline. Saramis Global clears that backlog inside the 24-hour window instead of letting it carry into the final week.
Extra reviewers, testing hours, and lead-schedule clearance come in for the peak weeks and step back down once it passes, so no fixed headcount sits idle the rest of the year.
Buy that capacity the way your firm prefers: fixed fee, block hours, dedicated staff, or part-time staff. Block hours suit a season whose shape is still uncertain; a fixed fee suits a named file with a known deadline. Name the one that fits on the call, and the scope is written to it.
5h
UK overlap window
3h
US overlap window
4h
AU overlap window
Confidentiality
Your file stays inside controlled access
Confidentiality undertakings apply before any file is opened, not after a concern is raised. Nothing about your engagement, your client, or your review notes moves outside the access list you set.
NDAs
Confidentiality undertakings are signed before a file, name, or figure changes hands. The undertaking covers the engagement, the client, and every document in between.
Controlled access
Access is scoped per engagement and per person, not shared across the wider team. Nobody outside the assigned team can open the file, and every access change is logged.
Work inside your systems
Fieldwork stays in the platforms your firm already runs, under your own access controls. Nothing is retained once the engagement closes.
Access is controlled per engagement, and where your firm asks for it, work happens in your systems rather than ours. See Quality & Security for how review layers apply across every engagement.
Questions
Audit support, answered directly
Does Saramis Global sign the audit report?
No. Saramis Global prepares and supports the file; your engagement partner signs the audit report. Saramis Global never signs, never issues an opinion, and never contacts your audit client unless you agree to it in advance.
Can an offshore firm sign an audit opinion?
No. An audit opinion is signed by the auditor appointed under the law of the company's own jurisdiction, and an offshore support provider is never that auditor. Working papers, testing, and completion support prepared offshore become evidence inside the appointed auditor's file; the opinion itself stays with your firm.
Who signs the audit report on a UK, US, or Australian engagement?
The auditor appointed in that jurisdiction. In the UK, section 1210 of the Companies Act 2006 defines the statutory auditor, and the senior statutory auditor signs in their own name on the firm's behalf. In the US, the appointed audit firm issues the opinion. In Australia, a registered company auditor signs under the Corporations Act 2001. Saramis Global is never the signing auditor in any of them.
Why can Saramis Global never be the signing auditor?
Because the law rules it out. Saramis Global is an Indian private limited company, and under section 141 of the Companies Act 2013 only a chartered accountant holding a certificate of practice is eligible for appointment as a statutory auditor. The firm is not an ICAI-registered audit practice, so support to signature, never sign, is a compliance boundary before it is a positioning line.
Whose audit methodology do you follow?
Yours. Working papers, lead schedules, and documentation are built inside your existing methodology and templates, not migrated to a different framework. Saramis Global adapts to your naming conventions and review-note format from the first working paper.
Do you work in our audit software?
Yes. The team works in CaseWare, Inflo, DataSnipper, Bright Workpapers (renamed from MyWorkpapers), and Excel-based files, and the file is built inside your own audit platform and file structure wherever your firm requires it, on your licences and your access controls. Working in something less common? The team trains on your platform before it touches your file. Nothing is copied to a system outside your control, and the indexing scheme your platform enforces is the one the working papers follow.
Which auditing standards does the file follow?
The International Standards on Auditing, plus whatever national standards your jurisdiction adds on top. Three carry the most weight: ISA 200 on the auditor's overall objectives, ISA 315 on assessing risks of material misstatement, and ISA 700 on forming the opinion, which stays with your engagement partner. India's SA 200, SA 315, and SA 700 converge with them, so an SA-framework file and an ISA-framework file carry the same architecture. The financial statements under test come prepared to your own reporting framework: UK FRS 102 and FRS 102 Section 1A, US GAAP, IFRS, Indian GAAP, or Dutch GAAP. Confirm both on the discovery call, and the file follows them from planning through completion.
Which sectors does audit support cover?
Retail, Manufacturing, Services, and Financial services (banking, insurance, mutual funds). Saramis Global is not tied to any one sector: the audit mechanics, working papers, lead schedules, testing, and completion, carry across industries, and the sector-specific risks get mapped at planning rather than assumed. Name the sector on the discovery call and the risk assessment reflects it.
How do review notes work?
Review notes are logged against each working paper as fieldwork progresses and cleared within 24 hours, so open points do not stack up towards completion. You see the same log your own reviewer would use, not a separate tracker.
How do we start?
Book a discovery call and name the phase you need covered: planning, execution, completion, or the full file. The scope that comes back covers that phase alone, and stops there rather than expanding into the whole service line. It names the engagement model too: fixed fee, block hours, dedicated staff, or part-time staff, whichever mode suits your firm.
Scope the audit-support phase your file needs
Share your methodology and the phase you need covered. What comes back is a scope for that phase, nothing wider.
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