FinTrace vs Delbridge Forensic Accounting 2026

Statement Analysis or a Broader Expert Brief

FinTrace delivers the statement analysis for your matter in a searchable Excel ledger and a readable findings report. It categorises the transactions, follows transfers between related accounts and flags suspicious activity. Every finding cites the original PDF filename and page, so the evidence is close to the explanation.

Your team sends statements as held, including scans, without sorting or renaming the files. FinTrace uses staged extraction and consolidation to handle thousands of PDFs across accounts and years. Source-grounding checks and independent reviews preserve the transaction facts throughout that process.

Delbridge describes its practice as providing expert accounting assistance and valuation services for legal practitioners and businesses. Its services include investigation reports and business valuations, alongside expert testimony. That wider accounting scope contains questions beyond the statement-analysis stage.

A completed transaction ledger explains the supplied bank records. A business valuation answers what an entity is worth. Where the matter needs a valuation or an appointed accountant’s expert opinion, specify that separately. FinTrace gives the professional the statement analysis to work from.

Scope the Financial Question Before Comparing Fees

Compare fees for the same financial question and deliverables. Reconstructing payments through bank accounts is a different instruction from forming a valuation opinion.

Delbridge’s family-law summary describes reviewing source ledgers to examine allegations about loan-account allocations or benefits received from a business. Its work therefore includes transaction investigation. FinTrace’s benefit is the completed statement-analysis handover, with the findings explained and their source evidence directly accessible.

The service list alone does not define an engagement. Specify whether the instruction includes reconstructing every supplied account or answering selected transaction questions. Keep report preparation and any required expert attendance explicit, rather than assuming they are bundled into one fee.

Working Papers and Source Traceability

FinTrace supplies the working transaction ledger as well as the findings report. The workbook contains source fields beside the transaction dates and descriptions. Amounts and categories let the professional filter transactions across the supplied accounts for further analysis.

The report explains suspicious activity and unusual transfers in clear language. Source filenames and page references let your team move directly from a finding to the underlying bank statement when preparing advice or addressing a disputed payment.

Consider an illustrative family-law matter involving personal accounts and a family business. The lawyer wants to understand payments between those accounts and also needs the business valued. FinTrace follows the transfers in the supplied statements and identifies gaps in the statement periods. The report brings the relevant findings together for the lawyer.

The valuation requires its own expert instruction. Relevant working records can include the business’s financial statements and tax records, together with ownership details and explanations of related-party balances. FinTrace’s ledger supplies the bank-transaction analysis within that wider body of material. The guide to forensic accountants in divorce explains the separate expert role.

Fees, Instructions and Review Work

FinTrace quotes a fixed base fee plus a per-page charge for the agreed matter scope. It completes statement analysis at a fraction of the cost of manual review or engaging a forensic accountant for the same work. The engagement and quotation process explains how to commission that analysis.

Delbridge’s services page states that its normal fee basis is hourly. The Family Law Services summary lists hourly rates including GST of $330 to $374 for forensic accountants and $682 to $935 for directors. A Technology and Resources Levy adds 2.5% of time costs.

Those hourly rates do not establish a total fee for your statement bundle. Compare written quotes covering the same accounts and statement period, with GST and any levy treated consistently. A valuation quote covers a different question and cannot establish a saving on statement analysis.

Missing records affect what work can be completed from the supplied material. Later statements can add another period to analyse, while a new disputed payment can extend the question being answered. Define how the engagement treats additions and clarification requests, including whether a follow-up involves explaining existing findings or performing further analysis.

The forensic accountant cost guide covers broader fee structures. Keep the quote for this matter tied to its specified records and required outputs.

Choose the Scope Your Matter Needs

Choose FinTrace for a completed statement-analysis handover that saves your team repetitive review and puts source-backed findings at hand. Forensic accountants can engage the service for their own matters, retaining more time for interpretation and specialist accounting work.

Include the following in the instruction:

• The statement period, including known gaps.
• The accounts and their holders.
• The disputed transactions and questions to address.
• The required accounting opinion, separately identified from statement analysis.

If a valuation or expert opinion is required, define that expert brief independently of the statement-analysis deliverables. This keeps the transaction work and the professional judgement clear in the scope.

Request a matter assessment with an outline of the matter and its timeframe. Include approximate page and account counts. Statements follow assessment and acceptance of the written quote.