Extended story: payroll account plug cleared before audit fieldwork
A regional distributor carried a single reconciling plug on the payroll account for three months. The balance appeared to tie, yet the controller could not explain the composition to incoming external auditors.
Our Outstanding Item Clearance Review aged forty-one lines, separated genuine timing differences from duplicate salary postings, and produced a tracker with owners for each remaining item. Two deposit slips had to be retrieved from off-site storage, which extended the work by two days.
By the time audit fieldwork began, the plug was gone and only six items remained — each with bank inquiry letters already drafted.