CCP 11-29-1999 - Laserfiche WebLink

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I City of Arden Hills November 11, 1999 Page Two - Audit Procedures-General An audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements; therefore, our audit will involve judgment about the number of transactions to be examined and the areas to be tested. We will plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable rather than absolute assurance about whether the financial statements are free of material misstatement, whether caused by error or fraud. Because of the concept of reasonable assurance and because we will not perform a detailed examination of all transactions, there is a risk that a material misstatement may exist and not be detected by us. In addition, an audit is not designed to detect errors, fraud, or other illegal acts that are immaterial to the general purpose financial statements. However, we will inform you of any material errors and any fraud that comes to our attention. We will also inform you of any other illegal acts that come to our attention, unless clearly inconsequential. Our responsibility as auditors is limited to the period covered by our audit and does not extend to matters that might arise during any later periods for which we are not engaged as auditors. Our procedures will include tests of documentary evidence supporting the transactions recorded in the accounts, and may include tests of the physical existence of inventories, and direct confirmation of receivables and certain other assets and liabilities by correspondence with selected individuals, creditors, and financial institutions. We will request written representations from your attorneys as part of the engagement, and they may bill you for responding to this inquiry. At the conclusion of our audit, we will also require certain written representations from you about the financial statements and related matters. _ Identifying and ensuring that the City complies with laws, regulations, contracts, and agreements is the responsibility of management. As part of obtaining reasonable assurance about whether the general purpose financial statements are free of material misstatement, we will perform tests of the City's compliance with applicable laws and regulations and the provisions of contracts and agreements. However, the objective of our audit will not be to provide an opinion on overall compliance and we will not express such an opinion. An audit of the general purpose financial statements performed in accordance with generally accepted auditing standards is not designed to determine whether the computer systems of the City are year 2000 compliant, or to provide any assurance on whether the City has addressed all of the affected systems on a timely basis. Further, we have no responsibility with regard to the systems of vendors, service providers, or any other third parties. These are responsibilities of the City's management. However, we may choose to communicate matters that come to our attention relating to the Year 2000 Issue. Audit Procedures-Internal Controls In planning and performing our audit, we will consider the internal control sufficient to plan the audit in order to determine the nature, timing, and extent of our auditing procedures for the purpose of expressing our opinion on the City's general purpose financial statements. We will obtain an understanding of the design of the relevant controls and whether they have been placed in operation, and we will assess control risk. Tests of controls may be performed to test the effectiveness of certain controls that we consider relevant to preventing and detecting errors and fraud that are material to the general purpose financial statements and to preventing and detecting misstatements resulting from illegal acts and other noncompliance matters that have a direct and material effect on the general purpose financial statements. Our tests, if performed, will be less in scope than would be necessary to render an opinion on internal control and, accordingly, no opinion will be expressed. .