During this stage, all the participants must be ready to work together and have a good understanding of their roles and responsibilties. This will keep the process moving smoothly as the Examination phase requires frequent interactions between the audit team and staff at the audited organization. During this phase:
- The Assistant Auditor General sends a notice of examination letter to the Deputy Minister (or equivalent) which outlines the audit plan, confirms the key contact and gives an overview of the audit team's professional responsibilties and auditing standards. This letter also requests that the Deputy Minister:
- ensure that staff are aware of the planned work, particularly those that will be involved in the audit;
- ensure that staff are made available for interviews;
- provide requested documents within 10 working days;
- reply to requests to verify factual accuracy within 10 working days;
- be aware that they will need to provide comments and a response to the final report within 10 working days of receiving their copy; and
- attest to his or her understanding of the contents of the letter by signing and returning a copy to the audit team.
- Based on the evidence-gathering strategy in the audit plan, each member of the audit team is assigned specific tasks and carries them out. These tasks include conducting interviews, requesting and reviewing documents, and other forms of data collection and analysis. While members of the audit team are working on their individual tasks, they also:
- meet weekly with the rest of the team to discuss their efforts and review each other's work for quality assurance purposes; and
- meet at least monthly with the audited organization to discuss preliminary audit findings and relevant issues, and document these discussions.
- When the audit team has finished gathering evidence, they identify their key findings and conclusions. Once these have been developed, the audit team:
- sends them to the audited organization;
- meets with the audited organization and documents this discussion;
- reviews issues raised at the meeting and determines how to address them (which may include further evidence gathering and making changes);
- finalizes the key findings and conclusions and submits them to the Assistant Auditor General and the EQCR for approval;
- completes any final changes before moving to the Reporting phase.