Forensic auditing is just like forensic criminology. The way forensic experts visualize the crime scene by analyzing bullets and blood, a certified forensic auditor analyses the financial documents to nail the criminals of finance. Financial auditing is also known as financial accounting. As a forensic auditor, you have to be a CPA (Certified Public Accountant), who can detect and prevent financial crimes related to embezzlement of funds and frauds. Such crimes are called white collar crimes.
If you want to become a forensic auditor, you have to use your auditing skills to chase money trails and perform auditing of financial statements. You can also assist corporations and private individuals under an audit to manifest their innocence. You are also decreed to prepare reports based on your findings and attest as an expert witness during trials. Thus, the role of a forensic auditor becomes even more crucial because he has to look beyond the numbers and give prompt responses in a courtroom during the debate. In other words, they are the experts of financial crimes.
Becoming a forensic auditor is not really easy. You must have a strong background in accounts and math. First of all, you must have a four year degree in accounts, finance, business administration or math. The rules differ for different states. And after you complete your B-school, some states require you to have a CPA (Certified Public Accountant) license. You can obtain this license through American Institute of CPAs (AICPA). This institute requires exhaustive academic components with a comprehensive exam. It also decrees 150 credit hours of finance, general education courses and business. You can complete this by enrolling in a program of master’s degree and along with a bachelor’s degree of four years.
You will also be offered some certificate programs when you enroll in a master’s degree after you are done with your bachelor’s degree. They are less meticulous courses and can be completed in less than a year, which means only 10-30 credit hours are required. But, whether you go for a certificate or a master’s degree, you will have to clear the TOEFL, GRE or GMAT exams. Moreover, most forensic accounting courses necessitate relevant work experience.
There are two certifications for forensic auditors. You can either pursue a credential of Certified ForensicAccountant through ACFEI (American College of Forensic Examiners International). You can pursue this credential after you have completed your CPA and built relevant work experience. For earning thiscredential, you have to enroll in a program from ACFEI which encompasses fraud prevention, judicial procedures, evidence collection, etc. You are required to pass the exam to merit the credential. You are not eligible to register for the program if you have any felony convictions prior to the course.
The other alternative is to pass a professional credentialing exam through ACFE (Association of Certified Fraud Examiners) and become a Certified Fraud Examiner. For this program, you are required to have experience in related fields like civil or criminal investigations, law enforcement and fraud litigation. You are necessitated to have a bachelor’s degree for a government board. It may substitute your years of experience in place of academic studies at its own discretion.
After you become a forensic accountant, you can specialize in various fields. These specializations allow you to pursue different careers like forensic investigators, auditing managers and forensic writers.
Some of these specialties are:
· Expert witnessing, legal consulting
· Reporting of business appraisals
· Investigation of insurance claims
· Construction litigation
· Securities fraud
· Computer forensics
· Insolvency, Reorganization and Bankruptcy law
These specializations require you to clear the exams after completing the credit hours through a body of accreditation such as ACFEI. These additional certifications make you eligible for pay increases and lead you to increased opportunities in the area of forensic auditing.
Apart from the academic specifications, it really helps if you have these personality traits in you as a forensic auditor:
A forensic auditor must be able to analyze the financial statements and find out the irregularities. He should be able to use compound evaluation skills so that he can understand how these abnormalities may become a cause for fraudulent behavior.
It is easy to be allured by different factors in this profession. But, to become a successful forensic auditor in the long term, you must be an ethical person, who can resist his temptations and bring justice to the white collar criminals.
As a forensic auditor, you must be able to scrutinize the minutest details of the finances. Sometimes we tend to overlook some minor details and it happens most of the times that the discrepancies are hidden there only.
You must use your critical thinking and interrogate using the right questions. It is the most effective procedure when you are going through the small aberrations.
A forensic auditor must be able to express himself in written as well as verbal communication. There are instances when a forensic auditor has to express the nature of probable crime in front of supervisors, juries and judges. Thus, verbal skills become important in such cases.
Cheryl Panattoni Forensic Accounting and Tax Inc
