The internal controls are the systems the church has in place to safeguard assets and to help ensure more than one person is involved with handling funds.   Some examples of strong internal controls are – two signers on all checks, someone else reconciles bank statements, two different cash counters, someone else making deposit besides treasurer etc.  Weak internal controls are when only one person does everything and no one is looking at anything. If that is the case for your church, you will need to pay extra attention during the audit since no one else is looking at the items during the year.

Our internal controls form is adapted from the form in the Manual of Business Methods in Church  Affairs.

First step, ask the treasurer the questions on the form below.  This will give you a sense of how everything works in the church and whether or not the vestry is reviewing the financial information.  This form  needs to be included with the audit.  You can either mail it in or file online.