Busy season is not a surprise. Calendar-year audits, reviews and compilations overlap with tax work, and later in the year come employee benefit plan audits and single audits with their own deadlines. Planning in the autumn leaves more room to adjust than planning in February. This guide covers the decisions that matter: how much work to accept, how to schedule it, how to keep review from becoming the bottleneck and how to protect quality when hours are short.
It does not rely on industry statistics, since firm circumstances differ. The points below are practical and are meant to be adapted.
Know the calendar
List the fixed deadlines that apply to the firm's client base, and mark them on one shared calendar. Examples that commonly apply:
- partnership and S corporation returns, due March 15 for calendar-year entities, with a six-month extension available
- C corporation and individual returns, due April 15 for calendar-year taxpayers, with extensions
- employee benefit plan audits, which support Form 5500 filings due at the end of the seventh month after the plan year-end for calendar-year plans, with an extension available through Form 5558
- single audits, due 30 days after the auditor's reports are received or nine months after the audit period, whichever is earlier. See the single audit walk-through
- lender and surety reporting dates set by the client's agreements
- nonprofit Form 990 dates and state charity filings
The IRS and Department of Labor publish the current due dates and extension rules in their form instructions. A due date that falls on a weekend or legal holiday moves to the next business day.
Plan capacity before accepting work
Count hours, not clients
Start with the hours the firm can really deliver in the season. For each person, subtract leave, training, firm administration, and the tax work that competes for the same weeks. What is left is capacity. Do the same for each role, because partner review hours and manager hours are scarcer than staff hours.
Compare with budgets
Build a budget for each engagement by phase and role: planning, fieldwork, review, completion and the report. Use last year's actual hours, adjusted for known changes such as a first-year client, a new accounting system or a new standard. A budget based on what the client expects to pay, and not on what the work will take, leads to overruns.
Be ready to say no or later
Taking a new audit in January that cannot start until April is a decision with consequences for existing clients. Set a cutoff date for accepting engagements that need busy-season work, and decide in advance what the firm will do for a late request: offer an off-season date, bring in outside help, or decline. Acceptance decisions are also part of the firm's quality management; SQMS No. 1 expects the firm to consider whether it has the resources to perform the engagement. See the SQMS 1 guide.
Consider outside capacity early
If the numbers do not work, arrange extra capacity before the season starts. Options include contractors, a staffing partner or a firm that provides outsourced audit support. Whoever comes in needs onboarding, a clear scope and review. See outsourced audit support for CPA firms. The firm's quality management policies should cover how external resources are used and supervised.
Schedule to smooth the load
Spread the work
Move whatever can be moved earlier:
- Interim work. Perform the risk assessment, planning, internal control walkthroughs and early substantive tests in the fall for calendar-year clients. Roll forward at year-end.
- Planning memos and PBC lists. Send in November, not January. See the audit planning memo guide and the PBC list guide.
- Confirmations. Send as soon as the balance sheet date allows.
- Inventory observation. Schedule early so the team does not have to be in two places.
- Fiscal year-ends. Where clients have a choice, off-season year-ends spread the load. Suggest it at renewal, not mid-season.
Sequence engagements
Sequence by deadline, size and readiness, not only by client importance. A small review with a ready client can be finished in a few days and removed from the board. A large audit with a late client should not block the whole team. Hold a short weekly meeting during the season to move people between engagements as readiness changes.
Set client deadlines with consequences
The PBC date is the first date that decides whether the schedule works. Put the date and the consequence in the engagement letter, explain it at the kickoff, and follow up the day it is missed. A client who delivers three weeks late may need to move to the next available slot. The audit readiness checklist gives clients a list they can work from.
Keep review from becoming the bottleneck
Review can become the constraint. Staff finish in time, and then the work waits for a partner who is in a different engagement every day.
Review in stages
Waiting until every workpaper is done and then doing a single review compresses the review at the worst moment. Instead, review as areas finish:
- Planning review: materiality, risk assessment and the audit plan, before fieldwork begins.
- Area reviews: lead schedules and key areas such as revenue and cash, as they are completed.
- Final review: financial statements, summary of misstatements, disclosures and report.
Early reviews catch problems while the staff are still on site and the client is still available.
Build review time into the schedule
Block partner and manager review time on the calendar for each engagement, the same way staff time is blocked. If the partner has 60 hours of review to do in March and 30 hours available, that is a planning problem to solve in November.
Make the first review shorter
A good senior reviews staff work before it goes to a manager or partner. Reviewers should be able to see quickly what was done, what the conclusion was and where the evidence is. Consistent indexing, tick marks and a lead schedule format help. See audit working papers, the lead schedule guide and audit tick marks.
Handle review notes efficiently
Batch notes, give each note an owner and a status, and clear them in the file and not in email. Notes that say "please explain" without saying what is missing generate a second round. A note that says what evidence would answer it generates one.
Engagement quality reviews
If an engagement needs an EQR, the reviewer needs time and the report cannot be released until the review is complete. Schedule EQR dates when the engagement is scheduled. See the engagement quality review guide.
Protect quality when time is short
Pressure is a threat to quality, and firms should name it as one. The quality management standards require firms to identify and respond to quality risks, and workload pressure is one a firm can identify. Reasonable responses include:
- a rule that a report is not released until the review is documented as complete, regardless of the deadline
- no changes to materiality or the audit approach in the final days without partner approval
- a defined process for asking for an extension from the client or the regulator when the schedule fails, instead of cutting procedures
- keeping the completion checklist as a real control, not a formality
- noting in the file when time pressure forced a change to the plan, and what the partner decided
Avoid cutting what is hard to see afterward: skepticism on estimates, follow-up on unusual journal entries, and subsequent events procedures.
Use technology carefully
Tools that remove repeat work, such as tying trial balances, populating lead schedules and drafting disclosures, can give back hours. The firm should approve tools, define what data may go into them, and require review of the output. See AI in auditing for small CPA firms and the review checklist for AI-assisted work.
After the season
Hold a short debrief while memory is fresh. Compare budget to actual by engagement and by phase, record which clients delivered late, list the items that caused rework, and write down what to change. That information is the input to next year's pricing, acceptance cutoff and calendar. Also use the quiet weeks to update templates, close open peer review items and give staff their time off. See the AICPA peer review guide for what the next review will look at.
Frequently asked questions
How early should a small firm start planning for busy season?
Several months ahead. Capacity planning, client deadline setting and interim work all work best when started in the autumn for calendar-year clients.
How do we stop review from becoming a bottleneck?
Review in stages, block review time on partners' and managers' calendars, have seniors review first, and use consistent workpaper formats so reviewers can find what they need.
Should a firm turn down work in busy season?
Sometimes. Set a cutoff for accepting new engagements that need busy-season work, and decide in advance whether the firm will offer later dates, use outside capacity or decline.
Can a firm use outside help during the season?
Yes, with onboarding, a clear scope and supervision under the firm's quality management policies. Arrange it before the season starts.
What should we never cut when time is tight?
Review of significant judgments, procedures on estimates and unusual entries, subsequent events and the completion checklist. If the schedule cannot be met, ask for more time instead of reducing the work.
CORAA prepares ready-to-review audit files for US CPA firms; see /us.
Sources
- AICPA, SQMS No. 1, A Firm's System of Quality Management (resources and acceptance and continuance of engagements) and SQMS No. 2, Engagement Quality Reviews
- IRS, instructions for Form 1065, Form 1120-S, Form 1120 and Form 7004 (due dates and extensions): https://www.irs.gov/forms-instructions
- DOL/EBSA and IRS, Form 5500 filing deadline and Form 5558 extension: https://www.dol.gov/agencies/ebsa
- 2 CFR 200.512(a), Report submission (single audit due date): https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-2/part-200/section-200.512
- Internal Revenue Code section 7503 (weekend and holiday due dates): https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/7503
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