thank-you all for your help. cI think that with the Quicken, and the forms we will be able to resolve the whole thing. If not I'll be back for more advice.
An annual audit should be the norm, not the exception. No one should be offended. It's standard business practice, especially just before a new treasurer takes over. Everyone seems to think an audit is done to find malicious intent, but I think mostly it can point out human errors, identify opportunities to tighten up procedures, and highlight the need for well-organized files. An audit should turn up any discrepencies, if there are any. You'll need all the bank statements, the check register, the cancelled checks, and any treasurer's reports as far back as you think there is a problem.
I like Hyway's suggestion of just starting at the beginning and loading everything into Quicken. A time consuming process, but then it's all in the computer, and all the math is done correctly. You'd spend at least as much time trying to make sense of unreconciled statements by hand.
I will email you a form I adopted from this forum (thanks to another PTOer!) that should help with your audit. You don't need to hire an outsider. Any conscientious, detail-oriented member will do - or a small team. But, your treasurer can not be the auditor. That's not accusatory, that's standard.
We had a similar situation only ours was the bank had us having more than the treasurer did. (Good problem to have [img]smile.gif[/img] ) Our entire board quit all between december and february. I took over as President in March.
You might not want to do all this, but I created a Quicken account for our PTA and entered all of the entries from our check book for the entire year. Then, starting with the first month, I reconciled each bank statement with my Quicken account. It wasn't easy because she had combined some I kept a list of all the entries from the statement that weren't in teh checkbook and all the entris in the checkbook that weren't in the statements (we had canceled checks that were never deleted from the checkbook). In the end I found lots of little discepancies and one major deposit of $1025 that was never enetered into the checkbook.
You can audit the books anyway you chose, but an Audit is the only way you are going to get the checkbook and the statement to match. Now, after we get our bank statement, the current treasurer balances her books, then gives me the checkbook and the statement. I enter into Quicken all the entries since the last month, then reconcile the account on the computer. This way, not only do we double check the books every month, but we keep a second record of the checkbook in case the first one is lost.
Audit the books--make it an annual thing. If books are a mess see if local accountant will donate time. Critter--Do you have any audit forms to send her?
Our Pto has had only one treasurer since one of them quit for personal reason. We have been trying to find out information regarding a large sum of money that is missing, with no luck. The treasurer is saying it is the banks fault and the money is actually there, but has shown no proof. We elected a new board (which she is staying on for another term), and I would like to give the new PTO a ending balance and all ins/outs for the year. How can I go about this without accusing or hurting anyones feelings?
