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Audit approach overview
Our audit approach will allow our client's accounting personnel to make the maximum contribution to the audit effort without compromising their ongoing responsibilities
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Annual and short period audit
At P&A Grant Thornton, we provide annual and short period financial statement audit services that go beyond the normal expectations of our clients. We believe strongly that our best work comes from combining outstanding technical expertise, knowledge and ability with exceptional client-focused service.
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Review engagement
A review involves limited investigation with a narrower scope than an audit, and is undertaken for the purpose of providing limited assurance that the management’s representations are in accordance with identified financial reporting standards. Our professionals recognize that in order to conduct a quality financial statement review, it is important to look beyond the accounting entries to the underlying activities and operations that give rise to them.
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Other Related Services
We make it a point to keep our clients abreast of the developments and updates relating to the growing complexities in the accounting world. We offer seminars and trainings on audit- and tax-related matters, such as updates on Accounting Standards, new pronouncements and Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) issuances, as well as other developments that affect our clients’ businesses.
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Tax advisory
With our knowledge of tax laws and audit procedures, we help safeguard the substantive and procedural rights of taxpayers and prevent unwarranted assessments.
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Tax compliance
We aim to minimize the impact of taxation, enabling you to maximize your potential savings and to expand your business.
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Corporate services
For clients that want to do business in the Philippines, we assist in determining the appropriate and tax-efficient operating business or investment vehicle and structure to address the objectives of the investor, as well as related incorporation issues.
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Tax education and advocacy
Our advocacy work focuses on clarifying the interpretation of laws and regulations, suggesting measures to increasingly ease tax compliance, and protecting taxpayer’s rights.
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Business risk services
Our business risk services cover a wide range of solutions that assist you in identifying, addressing and monitoring risks in your business. Such solutions include external quality assessments of your Internal Audit activities' conformance with standards as well as evaluating its readiness for such an external assessment.
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Business consulting services
Our business consulting services are aimed at addressing concerns in your operations, processes and systems. Using our extensive knowledge of various industries, we can take a close look at your business processes as we create solutions that can help you mitigate risks to meet your objectives, promote efficiency, and beef up controls.
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Transaction services
Transaction advisory includes all of our services specifically directed at assisting in investment, mergers and acquisitions, and financing transactions between and among businesses, lenders and governments. Such services include, among others, due diligence reviews, project feasibility studies, financial modelling, model audits and valuation.
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Forensic advisory
Our forensic advisory services include assessing your vulnerability to fraud and identifying fraud risk factors, and recommending practical solutions to eliminate the gaps. We also provide investigative services to detect and quantify fraud and corruption and to trace assets and data that may have been lost in a fraud event.
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Cyber advisory
Our focus is to help you identify and manage the cyber risks you might be facing within your organization. Our team can provide detailed, actionable insight that incorporates industry best practices and standards to strengthen your cybersecurity position and help you make informed decisions.
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ProActive Hotline
Providing support in preventing and detecting fraud by creating a safe and secure whistleblowing system to promote integrity and honesty in the organisation.
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Accounting services
At P&A Grant Thornton, we handle accounting services for several companies from a wide range of industries. Our approach is highly flexible. You may opt to outsource all your accounting functions, or pass on to us choice activities.
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Staff augmentation services
We offer Staff Augmentation services where our staff, under the direction and supervision of the company’s officers, perform accounting and accounting-related work.
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Payroll Processing
Payroll processing services are provided by P&A Grant Thornton Outsourcing Inc. More and more companies are beginning to realize the benefits of outsourcing their noncore activities, and the first to be outsourced is usually the payroll function. Payroll is easy to carve out from the rest of the business since it is usually independent of the other activities or functions within the Accounting Department.
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Our values
Grant Thornton prides itself on being a values-driven organisation and we have more than 38,500 people in over 130 countries who are passionately committed to these values.
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Global culture
Our people tell us that our global culture is one of the biggest attractions of a career with Grant Thornton.
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Learning & development
At Grant Thornton we believe learning and development opportunities allow you to perform at your best every day. And when you are at your best, we are the best at serving our clients
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Global talent mobility
One of the biggest attractions of a career with Grant Thornton is the opportunity to work on cross-border projects all over the world.
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Diversity
Diversity helps us meet the demands of a changing world. We value the fact that our people come from all walks of life and that this diversity of experience and perspective makes our organisation stronger as a result.
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In the community
Many Grant Thornton member firms provide a range of inspirational and generous services to the communities they serve.
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Fresh Graduates
Fresh Graduates
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Students
Whether you are starting your career as a graduate or school leaver, P&A Grant Thornton can give you a flying start. We are ambitious. Take the fact that we’re the world’s fastest-growing global accountancy organisation. For our people, that means access to a global organisation and the chance to collaborate with more than 40,000 colleagues around the world. And potentially work in different countries and experience other cultures.
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Experienced hires
P&A Grant Thornton offers something you can't find anywhere else. This is the opportunity to develop your ideas and thinking while having your efforts recognised from day one. We value the skills and knowledge you bring to Grant Thornton as an experienced professional and look forward to supporting you as you grow you career with our organisation.
Mitigating cyber risks in the coronavirus era
22 Apr 2020The coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic has resulted in significant disruption, and presents unexpected challenges for organizations of all sizes and sectors across the world. As we have seen, the spread of Covid-19 throughout communities is quickly changing how people live and work and how businesses operate.
In a world that now requires isolation, people and organizations have shifted a great deal of activity into the digital realm. The rate at which we have been relying on digital tools to connect and work these past few weeks is unprecedented. Employees and students are staying home, using videoconferencing services, collaboration platforms and other digital tools to do business and schoolwork. In their free time, they are going online to shop, read, chat, play and stream.
As many businesses continue to implement skeletal or “work from home” arrangements to mitigate the impact of Covid-19, the number of cyber risks to organizations rises. According to the Australian Cyber Security Center, the dramatic increase in people working from home—many of them for the first time—and the increasing use of online systems to manage social distancing creates opportunities for cyber criminals.
Cybercriminals have been ramping up their tactics to take advantage of those who may have inadequate or naïve security controls. As phishing, ransomware and social engineering attacks appear, many companies have opened up new vulnerabilities in their sudden switch to home working.
Employees may be using unfamiliar apps and bypassing controls in order to work effectively. The more that homebound employees struggle to access data and systems, the more they will attempt to use risky workarounds. Employees working from their personal or new unsecured computers could also create easy entry points to company systems. Staff are also relying more on email to exchange documents and information. Without adequate protection, organizations may lose the confidentiality and integrity of their data.
As a result, chief information officers (CIOs) during this coronavirus outbreak are facing a great challenge: playing a central role in navigating the crisis, even as their companies grapple with the implications. Moreover, CIOs need to balance two priorities at this time: protecting their organization against new cyber threats and maintaining business continuity. The overarching challenge is to protect the company while enabling operations to go on without interruption, but addressing these diverse and sometimes competing needs is not easy.
Therefore, CIOs must act swiftly to manage cyber risks in a pragmatic way. Remaining vigilant and ensuring sound cyber security practices is imperative. Businesses should pause and consider incorporating the following strategies in order to effectively mitigate cyber risks during these critical times:
Activate your business continuity strategy. Invoke a holistic business continuity plan (BCP) and clearly define standard operating procedures (SOPs) for employees working from home. Define SOPs for employees using their company-specific communication channels, such as Microsoft Teams or Skype. Pull together quick guidance, short training or knowledge sharing sessions for employees who may not be familiar with remote working.
Secure your IT assets. Enable authentications and patches, update solutions to ensure security and advise employees during the work from home period. In addition, promptly update your company’s antivirus, malware protection, data leakage prevention, mobile device management and other solutions. Inform employees about relevant antivirus or malware updates required to secure their home networks. Prioritize patching high-risk company applications that are used extensively during the quarantine period and ensure that cloud systems have been appropriately secured.
Prepare a cyber attack defense model. Stay up to date on various cyber attacks. With inputs from online cyber security feeds, include such news and information in your organization’s cyber threat intelligence in order to identify trends and emerging risks or threats, as well as to provide timely warnings.
Heighten staff awareness around cyber security. Help employees understand the risks. Employees working from home must still exercise good judgement to maintain information security. Focus on what to do rather than what not to do. Explain the benefits, such as security and productivity of using approved messaging, file transfer and document management tools to do their jobs. Remind employees about good basic security, such as strong passwords, not using open public WiFi, and not clicking on anything that looks vaguely suspicious. Reinforce to staff that home computers are not to be used for work or client data. Identify and monitor high-risk user groups. Some users, such as those working with confidential data, pose more risk than others. High-risk users should be identified and monitored for behavior that can indicate security breaches.
Sustain good procurement practices. Fast-track procurement that is intended to close security gaps; however, the procurement process should still follow standard due diligence. The need for certain security and information technology (IT) tools may seem urgent, but poor vendor selection or hasty deployment could do more harm than good.
Confirm the security of third parties. Nearly every company uses contractors and offsite vendors, and most integrate IT systems and share data with third parties. Should any third party fail to demonstrate adequate security controls and procedures, consider limiting or even suspending their connectivity until they remedy their weaknesses.
Stay updated on all regulatory and technical developments. Regulators are tightening controls and formulating new guidelines to tackle the growing number and complexity of cyber attacks. Stay updated on changes to data privacy and protection, to cyber laws and regulations, as well as to evolving risks and technical developments.
The Covid-19 pandemic is not just a world health emergency; it is an economic one, too. However, the information security of businesses big and small does not have to be an unintended casualty. By taking practical steps in focusing, testing, monitoring and balancing cyber risks, CIOs can fulfill their responsibility of upholding their organization’s security and maintaining business continuity. Businesses that are able to manage digital risks while providing stability will likely come out on top.
Third Librea is the head of the Advisory Services division of P&A Grant Thornton. P&A Grant Thornton is one of the leading audit, tax, advisory and outsourcing firms in the Philippines, with 23 partners and more than 900 staff members. We’d like to hear from you! Tweet us: @PAGrantThornton, like us on Facebook: P&A Grant Thornton, and email your comments to third.librea@ph.gt.com or pagrantthornton@ph.gt.com. For more information, visit our website: www.grantthornton.com.ph.
As published in The Manila Times, dated 22 April 2020