Engagement types, statuses and work-item steps
How engagements are set up by type and moved through statuses in Achekam, and how each work item's procedures are completed with a response and documents.
By Achekam · · 5 min read · For Accountants & audit firms in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya
In many practices the real engagement list is a whiteboard, or a shared spreadsheet with a status column that reads "in progress" for months. Partners find out a job is stuck when the client phones. Juniors tick off steps on a printed checklist that never makes it into the file, and when a reviewer asks how the bank reconciliations were checked, the answer is "I did them".
The fix is not more checklists. It is making the engagement and its steps the place where work is recorded as it happens. This article explains how Achekam organises engagements by type and status, how each work item's procedures are completed, and where the work then appears for each level of the firm.
Start with the engagement type
When creating an engagement, staff choose its type, such as an annual financial statements compilation, an independent review or a statutory audit. A firm can also add its own named types for the services it actually sells, for example monthly bookkeeping, a payroll bureau service or a body corporate's annual statements.
Under Engagements, Engagement Templates, there is a read-only list of Achekam's built-in service templates, showing how many engagements use each. It is a useful view for a practice manager wondering which services are really running, and how many engagements of each kind the firm is carrying.
Getting the type right at the start matters, because it shapes what follows. An independent review and a compilation for the same client involve different work and different sign-off, and treating one as the other is how a firm ends up with the wrong report in a set of statements.
Statuses, and when a partner must agree
Staff can list the firm's engagements by status, drawn from the server, open each engagement's workspace and change its status. Under the firm's governance rules, some status changes may need a partner's approval.
Know which changes those are in your firm, and whether they are the right ones. A common approach is to require a partner for the moves that commit the firm: starting work before an engagement letter is signed, putting an engagement on hold, or marking it complete. Moves inside the work, from planning to fieldwork, say, can usually be left to the manager.
Engagement statuses are only as good as the discipline behind them. A practice manager reviewing the list once a week, and asking about anything that has not moved, does more for delivery than any colour scheme.
Procedures on each work item
Within an engagement, each work item lists the procedures to perform and the documents required. This is the Procedures panel on the work item's page.
A step is marked done only with a written response and its documents, or set aside with a reason. Steps are never deleted.
A worked example in words: a compilation engagement has a work item for bank. Its procedures include obtaining the year-end bank statements, agreeing each account's balance to the trial balance and reviewing reconciling items. The junior marks the first step done by attaching the statements and writing that all accounts were obtained. The second is done with a response describing the agreement and attaching the reconciliation. The third finds a stale cheque, and the response says so and refers to the adjusting entry. A step for a foreign currency account that the client closed during the year is set aside with that reason.
When the manager reviews the work item, every step has either a response with evidence or a reason it was not needed. Nothing has quietly disappeared, because nothing can be deleted. On audit work, ACCA's article on examining evidence explains the difference between audit procedures and audit evidence, and how to decide which evidence is relevant in different circumstances.
Where the work shows up
Each professional has a My Work list and a Professional Inbox, showing what is waiting for them. The Supervision, Manager and Partner desks show each level's review queue, returned work and risks. Opening a review from a desk does not by itself give sign-off authority: the desk is a route to the work, not a permission.
For a wider view, the Practice Command Centre, the Work Dashboard and the Account Manager Cockpit read their figures from the server, so the numbers a partner sees match what is actually recorded.
On audit engagements, working papers have their own stages on top of this; see working paper review stages and review notes.
Before an engagement starts: client readiness
A new client cannot be marked active until it is ready. The Onboarding page under Clients shows a readiness checklist built from what the server holds, and offers "Mark active" only when every item is met: registration and income tax numbers, an active service, a contact, an engagement and an account manager.
That last pair links onboarding to everything above. A client with no engagement is not ready, which nudges the firm to set up the engagement, with the right type, before the work begins rather than after. Where the client's books are kept on Achekam, the appointment side is described in accepting a client's appointment and access level, and books the firm keeps itself in setting up books for a client with no workspace.
A set-up checklist for each new engagement
- Choose the engagement type, or the firm's own type, that matches the engagement letter.
- Confirm which status changes on this engagement need a partner.
- Check the work items carry the procedures and required documents your methodology expects.
- Tell the team that steps are completed with a response and documents, or set aside with a reason.
- Confirm the client's onboarding checklist is complete before work starts.
One thing to try this week
Pick one engagement type the firm runs often, open a live engagement of that type and read every work item's procedures as a reviewer would. Where a step is vague, rewrite it so that the response it asks for would actually be evidence.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
