SEC Professionals Groups

Hi SEC preparers,

I'm looking to benchmark how companies handle their tie out process. If you have any best practices or advice that has worked well, please share.

1. Who prepares and who reviews your 10-Q and 10-K tie outs? (i.e. prepared by SEC Staff, Accounting Senior, and reviewed by SEC Manager, Controller, etc. 

2. Can you provide the approximate size of your SEC Reporting team?

Thanks in advance!

Thanks for the great questions Jamie! If I remember correctly, our last survey of SEC Pro members told us that the average team size was about 3-5 people. That's a bit subjective, however, considering that many teams will use dual-purpose roles to help with SEC reporting at quarter-end, and then focus on non-financial reporting  projects when they weren't preparing a filing. When I was running SEC reporting teams, we had our SEC Staff preparing the tie outs (with clerical assistance from an intern), which would get reviewed by a manager, myself (as the director), and then by our controller (only for selected areas of the document) before being delivered to the external auditors. We also did our tie-outs in Workiva, so all of the review occured digitally, even our external auditors.

(Initially our auditors refused to go in to Workiva but we insisted. After a couple of years, we actually negotiated a reduction in audit fees based on the efficiency gains that the digital review created for them.) 

Hi SEC preparers,

I'm looking to benchmark how companies handle their tie out process. If you have any best practices or advice that has worked well, please share.

1. Who prepares and who reviews your 10-Q and 10-K tie outs? (i.e. prepared by SEC Staff, Accounting Senior, and reviewed by SEC Manager, Controller, etc. 

2. Can you provide the approximate size of your SEC Reporting team?

Thanks in advance!

Thanks for the insight Steve! This is what I wanted to get a pulse on. With smaller SEC reporting teams (i.e. team of one) I was curious how the they tie out assignments were spread out to the accounting team and at what level. 

Interesting note on the reduction in fees by bringing in the auditor. I've tried to pull them in for draft review and comments, and they were going to INCREASE our billing. But perhaps the tie out documentation might have been a better selling point. I'll keep this one in mind for the future.

Thanks for the great questions Jamie! If I remember correctly, our last survey of SEC Pro members told us that the average team size was about 3-5 people. That's a bit subjective, however, considering that many teams will use dual-purpose roles to help with SEC reporting at quarter-end, and then focus on non-financial reporting  projects when they weren't preparing a filing. When I was running SEC reporting teams, we had our SEC Staff preparing the tie outs (with clerical assistance from an intern), which would get reviewed by a manager, myself (as the director), and then by our controller (only for selected areas of the document) before being delivered to the external auditors. We also did our tie-outs in Workiva, so all of the review occured digitally, even our external auditors.

(Initially our auditors refused to go in to Workiva but we insisted. After a couple of years, we actually negotiated a reduction in audit fees based on the efficiency gains that the digital review created for them.) 

Hi SEC preparers,

I'm looking to benchmark how companies handle their tie out process. If you have any best practices or advice that has worked well, please share.

1. Who prepares and who reviews your 10-Q and 10-K tie outs? (i.e. prepared by SEC Staff, Accounting Senior, and reviewed by SEC Manager, Controller, etc. 

2. Can you provide the approximate size of your SEC Reporting team?

Thanks in advance!

Hi SEC preparers,

I'm looking to benchmark how companies handle their tie out process. If you have any best practices or advice that has worked well, please share.

1. Who prepares and who reviews your 10-Q and 10-K tie outs? (i.e. prepared by SEC Staff, Accounting Senior, and reviewed by SEC Manager, Controller, etc. 

2. Can you provide the approximate size of your SEC Reporting team?

Thanks in advance!

Our External Financial Reporting team currently consists of two very experienced managers and one fairly new staff member with about three years of experience, all reporting to the Director of Accounting.  The tie out for each 10-Q/K section is assigned to be prepared by one of the three EFR members and to be reviewed by a different one of those three or the Director.  Tie outs are either Excel or PDF (using a PDF editor called eCopy PDF Pro Office).    This is working, but we'll be considering Workiva Wdesk next year.

Hi SEC preparers,

I'm looking to benchmark how companies handle their tie out process. If you have any best practices or advice that has worked well, please share.

1. Who prepares and who reviews your 10-Q and 10-K tie outs? (i.e. prepared by SEC Staff, Accounting Senior, and reviewed by SEC Manager, Controller, etc. 

2. Can you provide the approximate size of your SEC Reporting team?

Thanks in advance!