Audits of Employee Benefit Plans Subject to ERISA - Society of Louisiana Certified Public Accountants

Overview

Auditing employee benefit plans

Employee benefit plan (EBP) audit engagements continue to be scrutinized by regulators and peer reviewers due to a history of noncompliance with applicable professional standards.

Through this course, you can gain the proper skills to perform EBP engagements effectively. You will learn about:

The steps of an EBP audit

Applicable professional standards

ERISA and SEC requirements

Commonly audited plans

You will tap into ways to plan and conduct effective risk-based plan audits to comply with professional standards while maximizing efficiency for commonly audited types of plans, including:

Defined contribution plans

Health and welfare benefit plans

Applied learning

You will do a deep dive into EBP auditing by working through the plan audit process from engagement acceptance through the archive.

Example forms and reports will be examined to illustrate effective EBP engagements.

Highlights

Audit planning and pre-engagement activities

Risk assessment, including consideration of internal control

Auditing the statement of net assets available for benefits

Auditing the statement of changes in net assets available for benefits

Other auditing considerations, including prohibited transactions and tax compliance

The auditor's report

Financial statement disclosures

Supplemental schedules

Prerequisites

None

Designed For

Auditors of employee benefit plans

Practitioners considering adding EBP audits as a service offering

Accountants in business and industry responsible for company benefits

Objectives

Recognize key terms and definitions related to ERISA plans.
Identify the different types of employee benefit plans (EBPs).
Recognize operational and compliance elements of ERISA plans
Identify the basic financial statements for all ERISA plans.
Recognize differences between GAAP and ERISA reporting.
Identify the risks of material misstatement related to financial statement line items on the statements of net assets available for benefits.
Recognize audit procedures commonly performed in a defined contribution retirement plan (DC plan) audit, including notes receivable from plan participants.
Identify audit requirements when using the work of a specialist.