Curious – internal audit analytics

Forvis Mazars’ analytics tool that combines controls monitoring, process performance and fraud detection

INTRODUCING CURIOUS

Curious is a business process analytics tool that enables organisations to monitor controls and process performance, as well as detect deviations that may indicate fraudulent activity.

If you are looking to automate controls testing within your business, Curious provides an intelligent solution that can utilise AI and machine learning to maximise the value of your analysis.

HOW IT WORKS

Curious has a powerful analytics test suite that covers over 100 tests across process areas, including, but not limited to:

Sales
Purchase
Accounts Payable
Accounts Receivables
Expense Analytics
Spend Analytics
Payroll
Journals
Tax

Forvis Mazars will work with you to understand your requirements and develop a custom test suite to meet your needs, with the option for role-based access restrictions. It gives powerful analysis through a pre-determined set of test cases developed through years of experience.

Fully scalable, the tool can evolve to meet your data needs as your business grows.

There is an optional ‘Intelligence’ layer which when enabled will use machine learning and predictive models built using cloud services to give powerful insight.

Implementation

Curious is provided as a fully managed service or can be implemented on-premise within an organisation’s existing IT environment. Our team follows a three-phrase approach described below:

Understand – We take the time to understand your existing process flows, test requirements and existing IT investments.
Implement – Each implementation is tailored to meet business needs and we work in partnership with your IT resources to minimise cost.
Manage – we provide continuous support to organisations until using Curious becomes part of their business-as-usual.

Reporting

Following testing, results are shared as exception-based reports detailing transactions, or tailored dashboards. Curious can integrate with your existing data visualisation software if preferred, enabling the fast development of model dashboards based on pre-built templates.

THE BENEFITS OF USING CURIOUS

Alongside saving cost and resource by automating controls testing, the key benefits of Curious are:

Optimised audits – Curious increases the extent of audit coverage and supports internal audits with focus on key priorities.
Increased stakeholder engagement – organisations can create tailored data visualisation layers to engage stakeholders with relevant insight, including multiple versions for different levels of management.
Earlier detection of deviations – through frequency-based continuous monitoring, any deviations from controls can be detected which helps to identify fraudulent activity.