Introduction and client background

You are the audit senior of Blair & Co and your team has just completed the interim audit of Chuck Industries Co, whose year end is 31 January 2012. You are in the process of reviewing the systems testing completed on the payroll cycle, as well as preparing the audit programmes for the final audit.

Chuck Industries Co manufactures lights and the manufacturing process is predominantly automated; however there is a workforce of 85 employees, who monitor the machines, as well as approximately 50 employees who work in sales and administration. The company manufactures 24 hours a day seven days a week.

Below is a description of the payroll system along with deficiencies identified by the audit team:

Factory workforce

The company operates three shifts every day with employees working eight hours each. They are required to clock in and out using an employee swipe card, which identifies the employee number and links into the hours worked report produced by the computerised payroll system.

Employees are paid on an hourly basis for each hour worked. There is no monitoring/supervision of the clocking in/out process and an employee was witnessed clocking in several employees using their employee swipe cards.

The payroll department calculates on a weekly basis the cash wages to be paid to the workforce, based on the hours worked report multiplied by the hourly wage rate, with appropriate tax deductions. These calculations are not checked by anyone as they are generated by the payroll system. During the year the hourly wage was increased by the Human Resources (HR) department and this was notified to the payroll department verbally.

Each Friday, the payroll department prepares the pay packets and physically hands these out to the workforce, who operate the morning and late afternoon shifts, upon production of identification. However, for the night shift workers, the pay packets are given to the factory supervisor to distribute. If any night shift employees are absent on pay day then the factory supervisor keeps these wages and returns them to the payroll department on Monday.

Sales and administration staff

The sales and administration staff are paid monthly by bank transfer. Employee numbers do fluctuate and during July two administration staff joined; however, due to staff holidays in the HR department, they delayed informing the payroll department, resulting in incorrect salaries being paid out.

Last week the company had a visit from the tax authorities who reviewed the wages calculations and discovered that incorrect levels of tax had been deducted by the payroll system, as the tax rates from the previous year had not been updated. The finance director has queried with the audit team why they did not identify this non-compliance with tax legislation during last year’s audit.

Required:

Explain the responsibilities of management and auditors of Chuck Industries Co in relation to compliance with law and regulations under ISA 250 Consideration of Laws and Regulations in an Audit of Financial Statements. (4 marks)