Sales Audit in UAE

A Sales Audit is conducted primarily focusing on improving the efficiency of the sales department of the organization. It is performed by either an internal or external sales auditor. The sales audit usually involve – analysis of the hiring procedure, market analysis such as the SWOT analysis and checking the sales strategy of the company.

It must be well noted that the sales and marketing departments of a company are inter-related. If the sales department helps in strategizing the volume of products and services to be sold, the marketing department helps in further enhancing the sales department by attracting potential clients through thus both these departments are taken into consideration while conducting a sales audit.

A well conducted Sales Audit has many benefits such as – enhancing sales performance, helping to improve the reputation of the company to the stakeholders and external parties, reduce overall capital costs and enabling it to spot any unethical and fraudulent activities, among many others.

In the UAE, a Sales Audit is mandatory for retail businesses of shopping centres. The business conducting Sales Audit or Gross Turnover Audit may require to submit an audited Turn Over statement to the relevant authorities. Gross turnover is the total sales generated by the retail business in a particular financial period or year. The auditor conducts the sales audit and submits the turnover report after verifying the revenue/Gross Sales generated by the company in that particular period.

This is a general practice by the Mall Management/Property Management who charge a certain percentage from the tenant/the retail owner on the basis of their generated revenue.

The Sales Audit procedure

As per the law, a sales audit in the UAE will include the following procedures:

Verification of day-to-day sales with respect to supporting documents.
The auditors prepare and prepare the audit report in accordance with the conditions established in the contract.
A check is performed to ensure that the gross sales report and list of sales invoices for the lease period match the associated ledgers or ledger.
A vouching is done for the sample invoices from the sales report and the sales amount is compared to the invoice list.
Checks are performed to ensure the accuracy of the gross sales statement.
Auditors review current internal control system for revenue / invoice cycle to verify completeness, accuracy, and adequacy of sales records.

While conducting the audit, the sales auditor will check the following documents: