Don’t procrastinate on conducting your ACH audit

Annual audits can be completed anytime throughout the year, audit guides being released earlier in 2011

We know what you’re thinking—you just finished your ACH audit, and you have about ten more months until you have to worry about it again. Due at the beginning of December each year, this audit, which is mandated by NACHA, the electronic payments association that regulates the ACH system, provides an assessment of a financial institutions’ previous year’s ACH processes and activity to ensure they are in line with the latest rules and regulations. And, while the deadline for this audit is in the last month of the year, it can be completed at any point throughout the year. It doesn’t need to loom large over your credit union all year long.

To enable credit unions to complete their annual ACH audits earlier within the year, EPCOR has bumped up the release of its ACH Audit Compliance Guide to the end of the first quarter 2011. (Members on Corporate One’s ACH solution receive this guide free as a result of our partnership with EPCOR). Corporate One is adjusting its processes to conduct our audit annually in the first quarter of the year. Like most credit unions, we usually conduct our audit in the late fall; however, to serve our members better and maximize efficiencies, we’ve decided on an earlier timeline (and we’ll be sure to notify all members once we’ve completed). Plus, as the audit takes a lot of work, we know it will be good to get it completed and not have that deadline looming over our heads. We encourage your credit union to look at the year ahead and see if you have the same opportunity to get this audit off your plate sooner rather than later.