You are an audit senior of Viola & Co and are currently conducting the audit of Poppy Co for the year ended 30 June 20X6.

Materiality has been set at $50,000, and you are carrying out the detailed substantive testing on the year-end payables balance. The audit manager has emphasised that understatement of the trade payables balance is a significant audit risk.

Below is an extract from the list of supplier statements as at 30 June 20X6 held by the company and corresponding payables ledger balances at the same date along with some commentary on the noted differences:

Carnation Co
The difference in the balance is due to an invoice which is under dispute due to faulty goods which were returned on 29 June 20X6.

Lily Co
The difference in the balance is due to the supplier statement showing an invoice dated 28 June 20X6 for $70,000 which was not recorded in the financial statements until after the year end. The payables clerk has advised the audit team that the invoice was not received until 2 July 20X6.

The audit manager has asked you to review the results of some statistical sampling testing, which resulted in 20% of the payables balance being tested.

The testing results indicate that there is a $45,000 error in the sample: $20,000 which is due to invoices not being recorded in the correct period as a result of weak controls and additionally there is a one-off error of $25,000 which was made by a temporary clerk.

What would be an appropriate course of action on the basis of these results?

A. The error is immaterial and therefore no further work is required
B. The effect of the control error should be projected across the whole population
C. Poppy Co should be asked to adjust the payables figure by $45,000
D. A different sample should be selected as these results are not reflective of the population