Treat the auditor's PBC list as a workflow, not an inbox. AI can split the list by owner, find the documents you already hold, draft each response and track what is late. A finance lead reviews every file and explanation before it is uploaded, so nothing reaches the auditor that your team has not checked.
#Key takeaways
- Most PBC pain comes from unclear requests, scattered documents and nobody owning each item, not from the size of the list.
- AI is useful for reading each request, matching it to the right owner and folder, and drafting the cover note.
- A person checks every schedule, sample and explanation before it is uploaded; the auditor relies on what you send.
- A well-kept shared tracker and a single audit liaison solve much of this without any AI.
- Measure items delivered on first request, items sent back by the auditor, and the questions you had to ask about unclear requests.
#What does PBC season look like for a controller?
The auditor sends a list of requests, often a few hundred lines in Excel or inside their portal: fixed asset additions, a sample of invoices, bank confirmations, contracts, payroll reports, board minutes. The controller splits it by hand, emails owners in AP, payroll, treasury and legal, and keeps a tracker that is out of date by lunchtime.
Many items are hard to read. One says 'support for sample 14', another asks for a schedule that exists under a different name. A suralink via business wire, august 2025 industry report found 82% of clients said audit firm requests were unclear or time-consuming, and 62% reported five or more miscommunications per engagement.
#Which audit prep tasks can AI take on?
- Read each request and rewrite it in plain words, with the likely document type and owner.
- Search your shared drive, ERP exports and email archive for documents that already answer it, and list them for the owner to confirm.
- Draft a cover note for each item, including what is attached and which period it covers.
- Keep the tracker current from uploads and replies, and remind owners of items not yet started.
- Flag requests that repeat last year's list, so the team reuses checked work instead of starting over.
Keep with people: the judgement on what an item really asks for, every number in a schedule, management's explanations, and anything about estimates, provisions or disputes. Those are representations to your auditor.
#What does a practical PBC playbook look like?
- Name one audit liaison who owns the list and the tracker.
- Ask the auditor for the list early and agree what each unclear item means before work starts.
- Give every item one owner by name, not 'finance'.
- Keep a folder structure that matches the list numbering, and store last year's answers beside it.
- Send items in agreed batches rather than one by one.
- Review the auditor's follow-up questions afterwards and fix the source of the most common ones before the next year-end.
This is ordinary human oversight, the same idea the NIST AI risk management framework, january 2023 sets out: name the person accountable for each output and keep a record of what they approved.
#When is a tracker and an audit liaison enough?
If your list is short, the same auditor returns each year and one experienced controller runs it, a shared tracker in Excel or SharePoint and a clear owner per item are enough. The auditor's own portal may also do the tracking. AI earns its place when the list is long, spread across entities, in Arabic and English, or when the same questions return every year because nothing is reused.
#How does Stennir run audit prep with AI?
Stennir's AI consulting audit looks at your year-end alongside the monthly close and ranks where AI saves the most work. If audit prep is the pick, AI implementation builds the workflow over your shared drive, ERP exports and the auditor's list, hosted where your rules require, with a finance lead approving every upload and every action logged.
AI training through the AI Operator Program then teaches the owners in AP, payroll and treasury to use it on their own items.
We are
Stennir builds the PBC workflow inside your own files and tools, with a finance lead approving everything that goes to the auditor.
We aren't
Stennir is not an audit firm, does not give an audit opinion, and does not send anything to your auditor on its own.
#What should a controller do next?
Take last year's PBC list and mark which items you answered with a document you already had. That share is what AI can find for you. Read more at AI for finance and in worked example: contract review with a full audit trail, then take the free readiness assessment or book a 30-minute call.
#Common questions
Will our auditor accept documents that AI helped find?
The auditor assesses the documents, not how you found them. The AI only locates and organises files you already hold, and a person on your team checks each one before upload. It is still worth telling your audit partner how the workflow runs, so their team knows who to ask.
Can the AI prepare audit schedules?
It can draft a schedule from your ERP exports, such as a fixed asset roll-forward, and show where each figure came from. A person checks every number against the ledger and signs it off. The AI does not estimate provisions, make judgements or invent figures to make a schedule balance.
What do you need from us to start?
Last year's PBC list with your responses, access to the folders where audit files are kept, a few ERP exports and the name of the audit liaison. Owners in each team explain where their documents usually live, which shapes where the search looks first.
Where do our audit files stay?
In your own drive and accounts, in the hosting region your rules require. Stennir does not copy contracts, payroll or board minutes into its own systems. Access is limited to the folders you grant, every action is logged, and you keep the accounts, the data and the off switch.
