ERP Audit Consultant, Egypt

An operational review, not a financial audit

Egyptian companies already deal with auditors, tax inspections and their accountant's year-end work, so it helps to be precise about what this review is. I look at the ERP as a working system: whether its configuration fits the business, whether its data can be trusted, whether its controls behave as management assumes and whether its reports are used.

I do not audit financial statements, give tax opinions or deal with the Egyptian Tax Authority on your behalf. Those responsibilities stay with your external auditor, your tax advisor and your finance team. What the review offers them is evidence: a list of documents that never reached the authority, users with conflicting permissions or costing that ignores import charges is useful to every one of them.

The review usually makes sense when:

• The system has been live for a while, but month-end still needs heavy manual adjustment.
• Rejected e-invoices or e-receipts keep returning and only one or two people can fix them.
• Management doubts product or project margins after a currency movement.
• A new owner, finance director or group parent wants an independent view of what is in place.

You will find the overall method on my ERP health check page; the sections below cover what Egypt adds.

E-invoices, e-receipts and the documents in between

For companies in scope, the Egyptian Tax Authority's e-invoice system sits between sales and the customer, and its e-receipt system does the same for consumer sales where it applies. Many ERPs reach these systems through a connector or a separate tool added during or after implementation. The setup can look fine on screen while documents slip through the gaps.

For a sample period I reconcile three lists: sales documents posted in the ERP, documents the connector or tool shows as submitted, and the status returned for each. The differences fall into recognizable groups:

• Documents rejected for a missing or wrong item code and never resubmitted.
• Credit notes and returns submitted without a link to the original document.
• Branch or retail sales recorded in a point of sale that does not pass through the same route.
• Corrections made directly in the tax portal, leaving the ERP out of step.

I also look at the operating routine: who checks submission status each day, what happens when the signing arrangement is unavailable and whether anyone outside one or two staff can resolve an error. Which documents fall in scope is for your tax advisor to confirm; I give them a clear table of what the system actually did. Background on the platforms involved is on the Odoo in Egypt and Zoho Books in Egypt pages.

Costing that survives a moving pound

Egyptian manufacturers and importers often buy materials in dollars or euros and sell in pounds. When the exchange rate moves sharply, an ERP that was configured with simple assumptions can produce costs and margins nobody believes, and the cost accountant goes back to a spreadsheet.

The audit traces a handful of representative products from purchase to sale. For each, I check:

• Whether freight, customs, clearing and bank charges reach the item cost, or sit in expense accounts.
• Which exchange rate the receipt used, and whether supplier advances or letters of credit were recorded at a different one.
• Whether bills of materials and routings match what the factory actually consumes, including scrap.
• When standard costs were last updated, if standard costing is used, and how variances are reviewed.
• How stock valuation in the system compares with what finance reports.

The policy choices, such as costing method and revaluation, belong to your accountant and auditor. My findings show where the system does not follow the policy they set, or where no policy was ever written into the configuration. The manufacturing ERP and multi-currency ERP pages describe the target process in more detail.

Access, Arabic printouts and the parallel workbooks

Controls tend to loosen after go-live in any market. In Egyptian companies with several plants, branches or project sites, it is common for permissions to be widened to keep operations moving and then never narrowed again. I extract users, roles and approval limits and compare them with who should create suppliers, change bank details, approve purchases, post manual journals and issue credit notes. Each conflict is listed by person, together with dormant accounts and any logins the implementer still holds.

Printed documents get a practical check. I review invoice, delivery note and statement layouts for missing fields, wrong totals and data that prints in the wrong script or direction. Whether the Arabic wording is right is judged by your bilingual staff; I make sure their review happens and its outcome is recorded.

Finally, I ask each team to show the spreadsheets they keep alongside the ERP: production plans, project cost trackers, import files, collections lists. Each one is classified as a missing requirement, a training gap, a reporting gap or a habit that can simply stop. That inventory often explains more about why the system disappoints than any configuration screen.

What the report contains and how it is used

The final report is written in English for decision-makers. It opens with a short summary of the overall condition of the system and the most important risks, then lists findings by area. Each finding records the observation, the evidence, the business impact, the likely cause and a recommended fix, and carries a priority based on impact and urgency.

A licensing section compares what you pay for with what is used: modules switched on and ignored, users who rarely log in and add-ons that duplicate standard features. For companies whose subscriptions are priced in foreign currency, this section is often read closely.

Findings are written to be fixed, not to assign fault. Your implementer is welcome at the readout, and most items can be handed to them as a clear, ranked list. Where a broader improvement program is needed, the next step is usually ERP optimization.

If the review reveals a project that never truly stabilized, the ERP rescue consultant page for Egypt describes how that situation is handled. For the wider context, see the Egypt ERP consultant page and the Egypt overview.