Who Is Actually Running Your Employee Benefit Plan Audit?

The person managing your engagement letter and the person doing the technical work on your employee benefit plan are not always the same. A partner may sign the report and attend the kickoff call, then hand the real testing to staff you have never met. Quality tends to slip in the space between who sells the audit and who runs it, which explains why plan sponsors sometimes feel unsettled long after the fieldwork wraps up. 

In its most recent audit quality study, the Department of Labor (DOL) found that 39% of reviewed benefit plan audits contained major deficiencies, and firms performing more of these audits produced consistently better work. Who staffs your audit shapes both compliance and how smoothly the process runs, which is why it is worth knowing who is actually doing the work. 

Signs Your Benefit Plan Audit Lacks Senior Involvement and Continuity

A few patterns can give away how your EBP audit is being managed. None may show up in the final report, but you feel them during the work itself, and they get worse year after year. 

You Rarely Speak With an Experienced Partner

Partner names on an engagement letter mean little if you never hear from those people again. When questions about participant eligibility or contribution timing come up, they should reach someone with the judgment and authority to answer quickly. If every response routes through a junior contact who has to check with someone else, the partner is only a signature and not a true presence.

A Different Team Shows Up Every Year

Turnover chips away at the knowledge that makes an audit efficient. A team that learned your payroll quirks and recordkeeper formats last year is in a better position to move faster this year. A new crew every year means you have to re-explain the same details each cycle, and the auditors miss patterns a returning team would already have recognized. 

Junior Staff Handle the Complex Judgment Calls

Some parts of a benefit plan audit are procedural. Others demand real technical judgment, such as evaluating prohibited transactions, assessing internal controls, or determining when complex plan issues require additional audit attention. When newer staff make those calls without close review, the risk of a missed issue can climb. The DOL has identified participant data, contributions, benefit payments, and prohibited transactions as the most common areas of audit deficiency, and those are exactly the areas where experience matters the most.

No One Seems to Own the Full Engagement

You shouldn’t have to manage your auditors. A strong engagement has someone keeping track of the big picture, coordinating with your team, payroll provider, and third-party administrators, and making sure the audit stays on track. Without that ownership, requests get duplicated, deadlines slip, and your team is left trying to connect the dots.

What Partner-Led, Consistent Benefit Plan Audits Look Like

The best engagements are led by a partner who stays involved the whole way through and knows your plan firsthand. Planning starts before fieldwork, so document requests reach you early instead of piling up at the deadline. When a real question comes up, it goes to someone experienced enough to answer it. The same team returns the next year, already knowing your payroll setup and recordkeeper, so each audit runs a little smoother than the last.

Why the People on Your Audit Affect Risk and Efficiency

Who staffs your audit is not a small detail. The DOL found that firms performing more benefit plan audits do better work, and those belonging to the AICPA’s Employee Benefit Plan Audit Quality Center had fewer deficiencies. Put simply, seasoned people are less likely to miss something that leaves your fiduciaries exposed.

Experienced auditors also make the whole process run faster. They know which documents actually matter and what questions are coming, so they finish on time and spare HR and finance a pile of last-minute requests during an already busy stretch. A team that returns each year spends less time getting up to speed and more time on the actual work. Your plan is better protected, and your people get their time back.

Get Partner-Led Benefit Plan Audit Support From Insero Advisors

Who actually runs your EBP audit? At Insero, the answer is an experienced partner and a dedicated team that stays with you year after year. We rank in the top 1% of employee benefit plan accounting firms in the United States based on plan assets audited, and we bring that specialized focus to every engagement. Our employee benefit plan audit services pair early planning and technology-enabled processes with the kind of senior involvement that keeps quality high and disruption low. We serve defined contribution, defined benefit, and health and welfare plans with consistency and clarity. 

Schedule a conversation with an advisor today, and discover how we support the entire benefit plan audit engagement. 

Resources:

• https://www.dol.gov/agencies/ebsa/about-ebsa/our-activities/resource-center/publications/assessing-the-quality-of-employee-benefit-plan-audits-report  
• www.aicpa-cima.com/resources/download/ebpaqc-audit-advisory-employee-benefit-plans-sas-no-136  
• www.aicpa-cima.com/resources/article/ebpaqc-mission-and-requirements