How can companies keep SOX compliance costs low?
One way is to be prudent and rigorous in monitoring the costs of SOX compliance. Don’t assume that compliance is going to cost $2 million or so a year. Treat SOX compliance like any other business process and strive to lower the cost each year. It can be lower. Just as in a manufacturing process, working with professional advisers can help companies find ways to reduce costs. Another way is to take advantage of automation opportunities. For example, some companies don’t automate the collection of data that goes into compliance documentation. So, if auditors select a specific transaction, and the paperwork for it was misfiled or on some ones desk, the auditors may look at that as an error. They may then have to increase their sample size or do other procedures. That runs up compliance costs. If companies collect data more efficiently, hopefully electronically, and allow the auditors to select what they need from the population of documents, that reduces costs. Where else are companies m
