Accounting scandals can happen to any business. No matter if a business is international or not, financial accounts can be hindered, which can result in misleading and manipulated information. This can damage a business’s finances as well as cause them to become untrusted by shareholders and clients.
What Is Forensic Accounting?
Forensic accounting relates to the assessment of financial accounts and documents. The assessment will be to discover litigation or dispute matters, as well as fraud. The process of forensic accounting will utilize economics, finances, data analytics, and financial modeling to see whether a financial product is misleading or not. The assessment will indicate whether the account should be presented to the court.
The most common forensic accounting investigations involve record reconstruction and loss of profit and assets. These records act as a witness for a business dispute.
Who Hires Forensic Accountants?
A multitude of people and businesses hire forensic accountants. These can either be by individuals or groups from private or public companies. The most common clients of forensic accountants are those looking for help with investigating situations of potential fraud.
These accounts will be often categorized in three ways – misappropriation, financial statement fraud, and corruption. All of which involve identifying economic damages, royalty agreement misleadings, and other dispute matters.
Some industries that suffer from fraud accounting involve publishing and communications. Healthcare and manufacturing markets are also hit hard by financial fraud. The Association of Certified Fraud Examiners’ 2018 Report to the Nations stated that fraud losses total over $1million in 20% of cases. Of which, the hardest hit will be the publishing and communications markets.
The Services We Provide
At Onisko & Scholz, Brett Sterbens, CPA, CVA, CFE and the team here at Onisko & Scholz work on various services to help with all fraud and forensic and accounting cases.
Investigation
A common service that businesses request is investigation. A forensic accounting investigation involves looking into cases that entail asset misappropriation, embezzlement, misstatements of materials, allegations of fraud, and kickback schemes. Should your business encounter these issues, our team can investigate for you and analyze all documents and records. We can uncover potential signs of fraud and provide a detailed examination and final report to assist you recover your financial losses or loss of security.
Expert Witness Services
Should your financial fraud case go to court, you will need an expert to represent you and provide financial knowledge. Our team at O&S CPA’s & Business Advisorshas experienced professionals willing to provide you with expert witness testimony, which will present the right facts to ensure that you attain the best possible outcome from the jury.
Consulting Expert Services
For those that do not need expert representation in court, we can provide consulting expert services. This service will offer you expert help with your documents and ensure that you get the facts right for your presentation.
Trial Exhibition Preparation
To attain the best outcome for your forensic accounting case at trial, you will want to show off a great exhibition. Our team will ensure that your reports, exhibits, schedules, charts, and graphics present information that clearly represents your case. The presentation will be clear to understand and be the most effective during the trial.
Law Enforcement Liaison
Should you need help and support during your discussions with law enforcement, we can assist with that. Whether you need to report your case to the FBI or attorneys, we can assist with your dispute resolution.
Furthermore, there are some alternative dispute resolution services that we can provide.
Mediation
When you need help assessing your case, we can assist with the mediation process to provide you with clear and concise data. We can unravel the complex data and provide our findings to help during negotiation with the mediator or judge.
Arbitration
Some arbitrators ask for evidence and others ask for testimony. If so, we can conduct an in-depth financial analysis of the data and prepare the data as an exhibit, which you can present to the arbitrator. This can assist your testimony and ensure that you can present trustworthy and detailed findings.
Settlement Discussions
When a case gets to the settlement stage, you might need support with an opposing report. If someone opposes your case and doesn’t agree with your exhibit and data reports, then you might need to encounter further settlement discussions. We can assist with further responses and help you formulate more data to present.
Fraud Prevention
Every business can be at risk of fraud. Our fraud prevention service can assess your business and provide you with a report on how vulnerable your business is. If you believe you are at risk, we can help you develop and execute controls to deter fraud. We can also provide training schemes so that your business knows the right protocols for preventing fraud.
Data Analytics
Financial records can be complex to assess and analyze. Let our expert team do this for you! Onisko & Scholz will review your data and analyze it before presenting it to you, and other necessary people, in a simple way. This analysis can help detect any fraudulent activity by spotting anomalies in your data. If anomalies occur, we can then offer further investigation to help deter and resolve the issue.
Accounting Record Reconstruction
Should your financial records be completely misled or deconstructed, we can help you rebuild your accounts and reconstruct your financial position.
Why Choose Us
Choosing us, O&S CPA’s & Business Advisors, will provide you with expert help when you have a forensic accounting issue. Instead of losing your financial position and dealing with misleading accounts, we can help you recover your position and assist you with your case. We can help analyze your data to uncover anomalies. Spotting fraud can protect your business finances and ensure that you deter fraud in the future. Should fraud happen to your business, we can help represent you in court or assist with an expert presentation so that you get the best possible outcome to re-establish safety.
Our fraud and forensic accounting experts have plenty of experience to support any complex issue. We can help turn your data into information and resolve your matters to regain financial safety and stability.
Read more about “Fraud Basics for Small Business”
