Assess whether bonus triggers were gamed by cutoff (260b9b)

Situation

The desk packet is ghost-employee payroll extract after a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing. Audit-committee advisor in a distributor with offshore trading affiliates has to name Remove access or reverse the item or Temporary compensating control for this Forensic Accounting Occupational Fraud file.

Decision

Audit-committee advisor in a distributor with offshore trading affiliates must choose Remove access or reverse the item / Temporary compensating control / Approve a documented exception / Hold using ghost-employee payroll extract after a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing.

Hypotheses to test

• The population in ghost-employee payroll extract is the one a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing named, so Remove access or reverse the item follows for this Occupational Fraud file.
• The population in ghost-employee payroll extract is adjacent only to a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing; Temporary compensating control is the honest Forensic Accounting call.
• A distributor with offshore trading affiliates already contained a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing before ghost-employee payroll extract arrived; no new Occupational Fraud path.
• Provenance on ghost-employee payroll extract after a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing is broken; do not pick Remove access or reverse the item or Temporary compensating control yet.

Analysis required

• Reconstruct vendor, journal, or inventory lines in ghost-employee payroll extract through the window opened by a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing.
• Trace approval, SoD, and related-party links that ghost-employee payroll extract actually shows.
• Test cutoff, reversals, and system-of-record ties for materiality on bonus triggers were gamed.
• For this Forensic Accounting Occupational Fraud file, read ghost-employee payroll extract against a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing and write the one fact that would move bonus triggers were gamed for audit-committee advisor.

Recommendation

Choose Remove access or reverse the item / Temporary compensating control / Approve a documented exception / Hold on this Forensic Accounting / Occupational Fraud packet (ghost-employee payroll extract after a Big 4 inquiry on cutoff testing). The follow-on Occupational Fraud action is what audit-committee advisor does next: implement the option, assign an owner, and log the missing fact.