AAuditPro Suite· User Manual
Manual home› Phase 0 · Engagement setup
Phase 0 · Step 1 of 14

Engagement setup — get a signed engagement letter

Before any auditing happens, the firm has to decide whether to accept the client and agree the scope in writing. Three modules cover this: M03 Leads (pipeline), M04 Clients (master record), M07 Jobs (engagement instance). ISA 210 governs the engagement letter.

ISA 210 — Agreeing the Terms of Audit Engagements ISA 220 — Quality Management for an Audit Oman OAAA · Independence Rules

The flow at a glance

M03 Lead Prospect call 7 stages M10 Quote Fee proposal PDF · sent · accepted M04 Client Auto-converted Master record + contacts M07 Job From TPL-AA 12 workpapers seeded ISA 210 Engagement letter Lead → Quote → Client → Job → Signed engagement letter

Step-by-step walkthrough

  1. Capture the lead

    Sales Pipeline → Leads → New lead. Record the prospect's company name, primary contact, expected fee range, source (referral / website / cold call / WhatsApp / OCCI directory), and assign to a manager. Stage starts at new.

    Walk the pipeline as you talk to them — contacted → qualified → proposal → negotiation → won/lost. Each stage move is timestamped and forms the audit trail of acceptance.

  2. Run independence + risk checks

    Per ISA 220 + OAAA independence rules, before accepting you must check: prior-year audit relationship (rotation), shareholding overlap with partners, fee-dependence ratio, related-party connections, and any past disputes.

    Capture the conclusion in the lead's Notes field. If the firm declines, move stage to lost with reason — this becomes the record if a regulator ever asks why you walked away.

  3. Issue the quote (M10)

    From the lead detail, click Create quote. The quote inherits the lead's contact + estimated fee. Add line items: audit fee, out-of-pocket, VAT (5% standard), validity 30 days. Send via the system — a PDF is generated, emailed via the firm's branded SMTP, and the quote moves to sent.

  4. Convert lead → client

    When the prospect accepts the quote, the lead's stage flips to won. Click Convert to Client. AuditPro auto-creates the M04 Client record (auto-numbered CL{NNNN}), copies the primary contact, and stamps the lineage (leads.converted_client_id) for audit history.

  5. Create the audit job (M07)

    From the client detail, click New Job → choose template TPL-AA Annual Audit. The wizard asks for: financial year (from–to), planned start, planned end, partner, manager, senior, staff. On commit, the system auto-numbers JOB{YYYY}/{NNNN}, instantiates 8 task phases, materialises the folder structure under storage/jobs/{id}/, and seeds 12 workpapers + 79 procedures (you'll see those in Phase 3).

  6. Generate + send the engagement letter

    Open the job → Documents → Engagement letter. The template merges client name, fiscal year, fee, scope, deliverables, and partner signature. Print to PDF, get the partner's wet-ink or e-signature, send to the client via Communications module, and upload the signed copy back as Engagement letter — signed. Until that signed copy lands in the file, fieldwork must not start.

Form fields you'll fill

1Client legal name
Required · matches CR

Use the exact name on the Commercial Registration certificate. The audit report will use this verbatim.

2CR number
Required · 7 digits

Oman Commercial Registration number. Surface validation rejects obvious typos.

3VAT TRN
Optional · 11 digits OM

Tax Registration Number. Required if the client is VAT-registered (turnover > OMR 38,500).

4Industry + category
Lookup

Drives risk-rating, sector-specific procedures, and KAM templates downstream.

5Fiscal year
Per client

Common: Jan–Dec, Apr–Mar, custom. Determines audit period boundaries everywhere.

6Engagement partner
Required · employee picker

Carries the professional liability. Must be in the firm's partner role.

Try this

Open the demo data: Sales Pipeline → Leads → "Al-Bahja Trading". Walk it through all 7 stages and watch the activity timeline log every move. Then click Convert to Client and notice how CL0004 appears in M04 with the lead's contact already attached.

Watch out

Never start fieldwork before the signed engagement letter is in the file. If a regulator inspects the file and there's no signed letter, the entire engagement may be rejected — and the partner is personally liable. The system will warn you, but it doesn't physically block fieldwork.

Tip — fee benchmarking

Use Reports → Quote conversion to see acceptance rates by fee range. If you're losing > 60% of quotes in a fee bracket, you're priced too high (or undercutting on scope). 30–50% acceptance is healthy.

Who does what

RoleCan do here
PartnerApprove acceptance, sign engagement letter, set partner+EQCR on job
ManagerCapture lead, run independence checks, draft quote, create job
Admin staffSend quote PDF, file signed engagement letter, set folder structure
Senior / Staff auditorView only — no acceptance authority
What's saved when you finish this phase

One M03 Lead row (stage won), one M10 Quote (status accepted), one M04 Client + primary contact, one M07 Job (status not_started), 12 seeded workpapers, 8 task phases, and one signed engagement letter PDF in storage/jobs/{id}/. Total: ~80 rows across 8 tables, fully cross-referenced.

What's next

Engagement letter signed. Job created. Now the auditor opens A-100 Planning — the first workpaper — and sets the boundaries: materiality, risk-of-material-misstatement, audit strategy, and team allocation.