Hi!

Thank you for using www.trustdeed.com.au

I noticed that you clicked on my previous two newsletters regarding my new offering to audit your clients SMSF's at a realistic price. Please have a look at the website www.smsfauditlink.com.au for details.

Cornerstone to my audit service is the "FREE" consultancy service for your client's funds which I will audit for you. I will ensure that your clients fund will be able to use all the opportunities and strategies out there and at the same time complies with all SIS Act provisions and regulations.

Currently, I am offering my audit services to 15 accountants and will be singing about 600 audit certificates this year with three staff who are qualified to sign audit reports.

If you feel that below four real life case studies are in any way similar to your situation, you need to call me on 0411 56 46 26 and discuss on how I can help you. I will visit your office and discuss how we operate and audit one fund for you for free - and please throw the most difficult one at me, to prove my expertise in the SMSF space.

REAL LIFE CASE STUDY 1

I was requested by a firm of accountants, who purchase SMSF trust deed from www.trustdeed.com.au, to audit one SMSF of his client as his regular auditor (firm other partner) was overseas and the return had to be lodged urgently.

This particular accounting firm has two partners and look after 220 odd business groups including 40 Self Managed Super Funds. Accounting for SMSF is done by one staff member. One partner signs the audit report before the return is lodged and the other partners name goes as tax agent on the income tax return.

My task was to audit this SMSF which had assets worth $1.5M with husband & wife as two individual trustees, I noticed:

Ø      one of the members of the SMSF was over 60 but under 65 years and was withdrawing lump sums, however was working and was not on transition to retirement pension;

Ø      there was no spouse splitting strategy in place although the spouse was about 12 years junior;

Ø      the fund had never valued a commercial property after purchasing it about 11 years back - rent being paid to the SMSF by a related party was about 35% of value of the asset -  without a commercial lease in place;

Ø      member balance were split incorrectly between "Taxable" and "Tax Free" components;

Ø      older member was contributing non-concessional contributions in the same fund where concessional contributions were being made - which meant that the two components were getting mixed;

Ø      tax office record showed that the first deceased wife (died two years back) was still the trustee and member of the fund and the new wife was not on ATO's record as trustee of the fund

Ø      there was no evidence that the deceased wife's balance was paid out two years back on death - a journal entry transferred the balance of the deceased to the husbands accumulation account - as it was decided not to sell the commercial property to pay out the death benefit;

Ø      auditing partners employee (a fresh graduate) was auditing the fund for the auditing partner;

Ø      there were three past year audit reports on file with the auditing partners name on it - but they were not signed; which meant that the auditing partner may not have "really audited" the fund;

Ø      auditing partner never issued a management letter to the trustees;

Ø      accountant preparing the 40 SMSF's accounts was not supervised and confessed that he had never prepared SMSF accounts in any previous employment;

The accounts had to be redone to achieve the best result for the client and all above matters resolved before an unqualified audit report was issued. The partners were impressed with the quality and sharpness of work and I was engaged to audit the remaining 39 funds.

Almost with all the other funds, I had to overhaul the whole the fund to insure that it complied with the SIS Act and insure that it was squeaky clean.

The partners learnt new SMSF strategies and discussed SMSF opportunities with other business clients. The practices now has over 100+ funds from their 220 odd business clients and employ two full time SMSF accountants. The auditing partner is now concentrating on financial planning aspect of the business.

REAL LIFE CASE STUDY NO 2

I was invited by an accounting firm who has 20 SMSF to audit the funds for his clients. The accounts were prepared on MYOB software with no member balances.

Recommended that client purchases a specialist SMSF accounting software and call us when the accounts are done. I had to send my staff to train the accountant's staff on this new specialist software. Our staff completed 12 SMSF accounts and returns in three days as they were very simple. I had to send another staff member to audit them.

REAL LIFE CASE STUDY NO 3

Accountant has a friend who has a tax practice in the same suburb. The agreement between them is that they will audit each other's clients SMSF. In the past, no actual audit was conducted, besides using the name of the other accountant as the auditor in the income tax return. No audit fee is paid.

For the financial year ended 30^th June 2010, both accountants are worried as they do not have Professional Indemnity Insurance to cover for SMSF audit and since they do not audit any other funds, their Independence is questionable as they audit for each other only. We were engaged by both parties.

REAL LIFE CASE STUDY NO 4

This accounting firm has 60 SMSF they are happy with their auditor, who is also the ex-partner of the firm (now semi-retired) but charges close to $800 + GST per fund. Some clients have questioned this high fee and are seeking a cheaper alternative but do not want sacrifice on quality. They also want to cut-off their relationship with the ex-partner.

With SMSF Audit Link they were able to achieve both objectives.

For true independent expert SMSF audit and to learn the latest SMSF strategies (like borrowing, transferring assets to SMSF without paying any Stamp Duty, transition to retirement etc) for yourself and your client's, pick up the phone now and dial 0411 56 46 26 and spare half hour of your time to meet me. This will be the best half hour invested in 2011. Promise.