Evaluation of Audit Software

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Evaluation of Audit Software
The role of an auditor is to analyze a company’s financial transactions and to form an opinion as to whether the accounts show a true and fair view of a company’s financial position. Auditors use generalized audit software (GAS) to analyze huge amount of financial data efficiently. Two leading standalone GAS software programs are Audit Command Language (ACL) and Interactive Data Extraction and Analysis (IDEA). This paper will evaluate the two programs for needs assessment, product availability, support and cloud computing capabilities.
Audit Command Language (ACL)
ACL is an industry leader with an active community of more than 14,000 customers around the globe-including 89% of the Fortune 500 companies
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Interactive Data Extraction and Analysis (IDEA) IDEA can scan large amounts of data and allows an auditor to analyze and summarize information in order to identify irregularities and reduce risks much quicker than manually. IDEA main advantage is it’s compatibility with Microsoft’s Excel Software. IDEA is capable importing and exporting Excel files which is what most office workers use. IDEA’s strength is its compatibility with Windows MS Office, especially with MS Excel and user friendliness.
In my mind IDEA’s strengths are its great degree of compatibility with Windows standards and MS Office, especially with MS Excel, and user friendliness. This fact makes the use of IDEA more appealing and requires less training for new users.
IDEA is available in two versions. IDEA SmartAnalyzer provides basic audit tests reports and requires minimum training. It is supported by online help and easy to follow dialog boxes ("Programs," 2013). SmartExporter reduces the need for IT involvement to obtain data sets from SAP saving time and effort ("Exporter," 2013). It allows you to pinpoint and export the precise SAP data that you require for analyses and audits. Prices based on product features.
IDEA is not as popular as other GAS programs so the online community support is limited but there are community support user groups. The product website has a paid support services
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