Delbridge Forensic Accounting Alternatives: Australia

Choose the Replacement for the Statement Work

Choose FinTrace to turn the supplied statements into a searchable Excel ledger and a written findings report. The ledger brings transactions across accounts together, with categories that let your team filter income, expenditure and transfers. Each finding identifies its source PDF filename and page.

FinTrace takes over the conversion and review that otherwise consume professional hours. In one recent matter, work estimated at roughly 50 hours of manual lawyer review was delivered in about 10 hours. That example shows the benefit of commissioning the analysis as a defined service.

The report flags suspicious transactions, including unusual transfers and possible undisclosed income. FinTrace also follows movements between related accounts and identifies gaps in the supplied statements. Your team receives the findings and their supporting records together.

Delbridge describes a broader forensic accounting practice, including valuation reports, transaction reviews and expert witness testimony. Its published service summaries also cover loss quantification and critiques of opposing reports. Those are distinct instructions from completing a bank-statement ledger and findings report.

For the statement work, FinTrace is the practical replacement. Identify any valuation or expert accounting question separately, with its own instruction and responsible professional. Forensic accountants also use FinTrace directly to reduce the statement work within their own matters and spend more time on interpretation.

Why Change the Instruction?

Change the instruction when you need a completed statement bundle, a clear division of responsibility or findings that lead directly to the underlying records. These needs can arise as a matter develops, without any problem with the earlier provider’s work.

First, identify what remains to be done. Separate analysis your team has accepted from figures requiring reconciliation. Then list new accounts, newly supplied statements and additional periods. This prevents a replacement instruction from treating every earlier task as unfinished.

For example, suppose an accepted schedule covers one account but the client later supplies two related accounts. The new job can analyse the added statements and follow transfers across all supplied accounts. Any reconciliation of the earlier schedule belongs in the new scope, so its treatment is visible.

A change also creates continuity work. Someone must assemble the permitted earlier material, explain unresolved questions and record which outputs the team continues to rely on. Switching providers leaves earlier fees and missing records to be addressed. It does not erase either.

Assess the Substitute Against the Switching Need

Assess FinTrace against the output you need next and the work required to put that output into use. The replacement scope must identify the accounts and periods covered, alongside questions such as unexplained transfers or disputed expenditure.

FinTrace accepts PDFs as held, including scanned statements, without requiring your team to sort or rename them. Its staged workflow handles thousands of PDF documents. Structured extraction and source-grounding checks preserve transaction facts, while independent reviews support the accuracy of the analysis.

The gain is completed analysis your team can use, at a fraction of the cost of manual review or engaging a forensic accountant for the same statement work. FinTrace quotes per matter using a fixed base fee plus a per-page component. The written quote depends on the agreed scope.

Keep the new quote separate from money already spent. Budget separately for any agreed reconciliation of earlier schedules and any expert questions outside the statement-analysis job. A fee for a broader valuation or expert engagement is not a like-for-like measure of the saving on statement analysis.

If you need the detailed provider comparison, the FinTrace and Delbridge comparison addresses their engagement scopes. The alternatives directory groups other replacement guides by provider.

Separate Prior Work From the New Analysis

Preserve earlier work as an identifiable record, then state which parts the new instruction will independently check. Keep an unchanged copy of each earlier report or schedule alongside its source material. A later workbook must not silently replace the record of what was previously supplied.

Assemble the material your client may lawfully provide under the earlier engagement:

• Original bank statements, including the files used for earlier analysis.
• Supplied ledgers and schedules, with their version identifiers.
• Source identifiers connecting earlier figures to files and pages.
• Unresolved questions and a list of records still missing.

Check access permissions, confidentiality terms and reuse limits before transferring earlier working material. Distinguish client-supplied records from the earlier provider’s working files. Request the material needed for continuity without assuming an entitlement to every file.

Reconcile accepted earlier totals to the original statements wherever the new scope includes that check. Record the account and period behind each total, then explain differences such as omitted periods or different treatment of transfers. Keep unresolved differences visible until their cause is established.

Label inherited figures separately from independently checked findings. For example, an earlier expenditure total can remain identified as inherited while the new ledger records transactions for an added period. If both cover the same period, resolve the overlap before combining the totals.

For an expert handover, the guide to preparing bank records for a forensic accountant explains how to preserve the connection between statements and analysis. The same source record helps the next professional understand what has already been done.

Make the Replacement Decision and Handover

Commission FinTrace for the defined statement-analysis job, with the handover matched to your switching need. For an untouched bundle, define the complete analysis required. For added accounts or periods, identify the extension and any earlier work it must reconcile.

Where the problem is scattered source references, supply the original PDFs and the schedules that need connecting to them. Where responsibility is unclear, name the person who supplies missing records and the person who answers later questions. Keep any required expert opinion under a separate instruction.

Before accepting the quote, confirm the covered accounts and periods, the analysis questions and the materials to be supplied. Record how earlier figures will be treated and who will resolve gaps. This gives the legal team a defined replacement output and preserves continuity with the existing matter.

Request a matter assessment with the matter outline and required timeframe. Include the approximate number of pages and accounts. Statements follow after assessment and quote acceptance, so the new instruction starts with an agreed scope.