Forensic accountants have the eligibility to work in accounting firms, law firms, auditing firms and international audit firms. Forensic auditors need accountancy qualifications like MBA, CA, CMA, CPA, CS, and LLB. The professional skills of a forensic accountant are interviewing skills, detail-oriented thinking, communication skills, creative thinking, and analytical skills. The job is similar to a detective professional. So, interviewing, communication and detail-oriented thinking help to understand the fraud activities. The blog creates enthusiasm in the readers by providing details of the forensic accounting firm for the job opportunities. Company secretaries have scope for forensic audits after the completion of ACS.
International firms:
Forensic audits protect the company from financial loss, reputational loss and economic crime. Competitive risk, political risk, and high-risk business environments are handled with care by forensic auditing firms. They promote the best practices, support the investigation and minimise the losses. The investigation services provided by PWC are internal, regulatory, third party, anti-bribery, cybercrime, incident response retainers, employee misconduct, and sexual harassment. The digital transactions and R&D spending led to the increasing demand for forensic accounting. Some of the international key players are Ernst and Young, UK PWS, UK, Deloitte, KPMG, Netherlands, FTI Consulting, US, Kroll, US, Alixpartners, US control risks, UK, K2 intelligence, US and grant Thornton, US. The cost of forensic accounting technology is high. The industries in India have administrative limitations for conducting forensic auditing.
PWC, Deloitte, Ernst & Young, KPMG, Grant Thorton, McGladrey, Plante Moran, McGladrey, BDO, BKD, Rothstein Kass, baker tilly, Cohn Reznick, UHY advisors, Dixon Hughes Goodman, and Mazars are the international firms that are specialised in forensic accounting. 3rd Eye techno solutions, Bhavicomm tech, Orion security solutions, Ninja infosec services, pyramid cyber security & forensic, pelorus, the forensic investigations and consultancy services India, Zoom cyber sense, and whistle forensic is the digital forensic companies in India.
Indian consulting firms:
Deloitte, Protiviti, PWC, KPMG, Ernst & Young, Grant Thornton, FTI Consulting, BDO, Hari bhakti & Co LLP, ChetanDalal investigation and management services, GD Apte& Co, Pipara& Co LLP, Batliboi and purohit, T R Chadha & Co LLP, JLN US & Co, and Advarisk are the consulting companies in India for forensic auditing.
Indian Law firms:
Law firms that offer forensic auditing services are AZB partners, Trilegal, Khaitan& Co, Cyril amarchandmangaldas, and DSK legal.
Difference between forensic auditing and digital forensic audit:
Data analytics also help in tracking fraud activities. Financial record-based forensic auditing and analytics-based digital forensic auditing are the same. The stages in the digital forensic analysis are information governance, collection and preservation, identification, processing, production and review. In the first stage, stakeholders and the accused are involved to understand the information. In the second level, the server, data, and IT assets are reviewed. In the third stage, the raw data is collected from the devices. Forth stage is a data processing and indexing. The fifth stage is checking the relativity and managing the result. The forensic audit requires technical knowledge. They check the sequence of activities with the technical aspect.
Why mid-sized forensic accounting firms are good for learning professional tactics?
If the learner wants to enter forensic auditing after completing the professional course, it is wise to attend seminars and workshops from leading institutes. Then, a certification course also helps to understand the domain knowledge. The following points illustrate the learning scope with mid-sized forensic accounting firms.
• The Institute of chartered accountants of India conducted the workshop for forensic accounting on the 25th and 26th of 2021. CA. JyotBaxi spoke about the global and Indian scenario of FAIS, analytical procedures like CAAT, and case studies.
• Since 2015, the global forensic audit market has reached a CAGR growth rate of 6.3 %.
• Forensic accounting firms need to invest in cognitive technologies like block chain, data analytics, and social media analytics and risk management tools.
• Small firms provide learning opportunities in different transactions. Forensic audit firms deal with healthcare clients, manufacturing clients, financial services operators, mining, and oil and gas clients.
• The different types of investigations involved in the forensic audit are event and data analytics, cross-border investigations, regulatory investigations, corruption and bribery investigation, accounting malpractice and securities investigations. Each investigation has three phases such as documentation, data collection and interview.
• The different types of assignments in the forensic audit are fraud and financial crime, regulatory enforcement, investigation assignments, crisis management, reconstruction of complex financial records, dispute services, risk-based internal audit, ERP implementation and other allied forensic accounting, systems and processes audit.
• By working for different types of transactions and clients, the beginners understand the evidence-based, technology-based understanding of the law.
• The specialisations in the field of forensic audit are as follows: health care frauds, insurance frauds, procurement frauds, digital forensics, anti-money laundering, data analysis, fraudster psychology, expert witness, bankruptcy and insolvency proceedings, conducting interviews, economic losses analysis, and business valuations. Experience with clients helps in understanding the domain knowledge of a forensic auditor.
Conclusion:
Organisations undergo tough times during forensic auditing. Expert knowledge helps businesses to understand better. SEBI and Big four firms like Ernst, KPMG, EY and Deloitte conduct a forensic audit. Collaboration of private and foreign companies demands a permanent internal forensic auditor. Company secretaries have a wide range of opportunities if they wish to enter into a forensic auditing profile. Top forensic accounting firms in India – 2022 help the students select the right company. Financial misplacement and fraud are creating a hindrance to the growth of India. Forensic audits help organisations to grow effectively.
