Workbooks and lead schedules from the trial balance

How working-paper workbooks and lead schedules take their figures from the engagement's trial balance in Achekam, and how audit adjustments are recorded.

By Achekam · 11 October 2026 · 4 min read · For Accountants & audit firms in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya

The lead schedule agrees to the trial balance. The question is which trial balance. On many files the schedules were built from the draft the client sent at the start of fieldwork, the client then posted a round of year-end journals, and the figures on the papers were never brought up to date. The working papers are internally consistent and wrong.

Linking working papers to the engagement's trial balance is the obvious answer, and the details of how it is done decide whether it helps or simply moves the problem. This article explains how workbooks and lead schedules take their figures in Achekam, what happens when a figure cannot be read, how adjustments are recorded, and the one completion schedule that does not fill itself.

Workbooks that refresh from the trial balance

A working paper can have a spreadsheet workbook attached, and the workbook's figures are refreshed from the engagement's trial balance. When the client's final trial balance replaces the draft, refreshing the workbook brings its figures into line instead of someone retyping them.

Refreshing is refused in two situations: when the audit file is locked, and when the paper is under review. Both are sensible. A locked file must not change, and a reviewer should not find the figures moving under them while they review. If a refresh is needed on a paper in review, the reviewer sends it back first, with the reason, and the preparer refreshes and resubmits.

Figures it could not read are listed

When a workbook is refreshed, any figure Achekam could not read is listed. The point of the list is that a figure which did not update is visible rather than silent.

Treat that list as a review point, not as noise. A figure that silently fails to update is how the stale-draft problem in the opening paragraph survives on a linked file. A listed failure, by contrast, is something the preparer can fix before the reviewer sees the paper.

Lead schedules you can trace

Lead schedules are built from the engagement's trial balance, and each figure on a lead schedule can be traced to the trial balance lines that make it up. For a reviewer, that is the key property: a balance on the lead schedule for trade receivables can be traced to exactly the accounts that were added together.

Lead schedules sit in the Lead schedules tab under Audit Procedures, Fieldwork. Separately, the Lead Schedules menu entry opens the statement-line view of the Working Paper Control Centre, which groups the file's papers by the statement line they support. The two work together: one shows the numbers, the other shows which papers stand behind each line.

Recording an audit adjustment

When testing finds an error, staff record an audit adjustment on the affected lead schedule line, with a reason. The Adjustments entry in the audit menu does not open a screen of its own; adjustments live in the Lead schedules tab.

Findings are recorded on the working paper itself. A finding can be raised from a working paper and later closed or withdrawn, using the Findings and Exceptions tabs on the paper.

A worked example in words: the team's cut-off testing on the inventory paper finds goods received before year-end with the supplier invoice recorded in the following year. The senior raises a finding on the inventory paper describing the error and the evidence. The senior then records an audit adjustment on the trade payables line of the lead schedule, with the reason referring to the finding. The client agrees and posts the correction, the final trial balance is received, and the workbook on the payables paper is refreshed to the corrected figures. The finding is closed with a note that the adjustment was booked.

The schedule that stays empty

Here is the limit to plan around. The completion Summary of Uncorrected Misstatements stays empty, because no screen or route writes to the misstatement register it reads. The server code to record or project a misstatement exists, but no route calls it.

So an adjustment the client declines to post does not appear on any summary in Achekam. Keep a schedule of uncorrected misstatements as a working paper of its own: each item, its effect on the statements, and the total compared with materiality. That is the evaluation ISA 450 requires, and the partner needs to read it before approving the auditor's report. ACCA's article on the evaluation of misstatements explains ISA 450, including the effect of uncorrected misstatements, with worked examples.

A short routine at final fieldwork

1. Load the client's final trial balance into the engagement.
2. Refresh every workbook before papers go to review, and work through each list of unread figures.
3. Trace each lead schedule total to its trial balance lines on the significant areas.
4. Record every proposed adjustment on its lead schedule line with a reason linked to a finding.
5. Update your own schedule of uncorrected misstatements for any adjustment the client declines.

How these papers move through review is described in working paper review stages and review notes, and how the file is put together in the first place in generating an engagement's working papers.

One change for the next audit

Make "refresh and clear the unread-figures list" the last step a preparer takes before sending any paper to review. It is a small step for each paper, and it removes a frequent reason for a reviewer's first note to be about the wrong numbers.

General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.