Stratifying a population before the audit sample is drawn
Splits a large transaction population into sub-populations that share characteristics — value band, approver, location, posting route — so the auditor can size and draw a sample within each, and separately surfaces items whose attributes argue for specific testing outside the sample altogether.
- Effort
- Days of work
- Skill level
- Some technical skill
- Organisation size
- Mid-market
- Value
- Time saved, Quality
Tools named for this
- A clustering or stratification routine over the ledger extract
- A notebook or spreadsheet the engagement file can retain and re-run
- The client's own general-ledger export
What to check before you ship it in India
- SA 530 paragraph 8 requires the auditor to select items so that every sampling unit in the population has a chance of selection. A model that returns only the items it scores riskiest is not audit sampling at all — it is selection of specific items, and the file has to say so and conclude accordingly.
- A stratification the engagement cannot re-run next year leaves a working paper whose basis nobody can reproduce, which is worse than a cruder split that anyone on the team can rebuild.
Sources
Every claim on this page traces to one of these, on the date it was read.
- Non-Authoritative Support Materials — Using Automated Tools and Techniques in Performing Audit Procedures · International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board · that this is done · read 2026-09-01
- Standard on Auditing (SA) 530, Audit Sampling · The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India · a rule · read 2026-09-01