MEANING OF TEST CHECKING
Due to paucity of time and the numerous and complex audit work, the auditor may feel that he will not be able to finish the whole work in time. He shall also not be able to do full justice with the audit work. Thereby the whole of his labour shall go waste. Under the circumstances, he chooses to check and verify only a few transactions from each category, instead of going for extensive checking of the whole audit work, provided he feels and is satisfied with the internal check system in vogue in the enterprise. Such checking of sampling basis is known as Test Checking or Sample Checking.
By this method of checking he applies the result of the checking upon the whole audit work, i.e., if the result of test checking is favourable, he feels that everything is o.k. If on the other hand, the result of the test checking is unfavourable, he feels that the account books are not correctly and truly maintained.
Thus, Test Checking in audit involves the selection and checking of a certain number of transactions, e.g., 25% of the postings from Cash Book to General Ledger or all the postings from Cash Book to General Ledger for any two or three months. The object of such checking is to arrive at an approximation of certain characteristics present in the recording of mass transactions.
ADVANTAGES OF TEST CHECKING
The following
advantages of Test Checking may be enumerated:
(1) Saving both Time and Labour-
Test Checking saves both time and labor, which can be
utilized by the auditor elsewhere. By this method, the audit work of big enterprises
can be completed in a lesser period and reports are made available to the
shareholders.
(2) Possibility of undertaking the Audit of Many Manufacturing and or Trading Concerns-
Test Checking takes less time and energy
than the audit to complete the audit work of an enterprise. This saving of time
and energy can be utilized by the auditor in undertaking the audit work of
other concerns.
(3) Moral Effect of Employees-
The employees of the
enterprise do not know which entries or which documents can be included in the
samples by the auditor. This uncertainty in their minds keep their morale high.
They are indirectly checked to do their work carefully and desist from making
frauds and errors themselves or at the instance of others.
(4) Trustworthy Conclusions-
In Test Checking samples are
taken from all the records. These sample transactions are examined fully and
carefully. Therefore, the conclusions based on these examinations are trustworthy.
(5) More Emphasis on Internal Check System-
Satisfactory
Internal Check System is a pre-requisite for Test Checking. Therefore, he can
give suggestions to the employer to make the internal check system sound.
