Ali is responsible for preparing bank reconciliation statements at Broad Ltd. Broad Ltd has many bank accounts, including separate accounts for each major branch, imprest accounts for salaries and dividends, and accounts kept in foreign currency for overseas divisions. Ali maintains records including bank statements and weekly bank reconciliations for each account. In addition, there are files containing correspondence with banks about disputed transactions, dishonoured cheques from Broad Ltd’s customers and other bank-initiated transactions such as fees and interest.

Required

(a) Comment on the persuasiveness of the evidence in Ali’s files for Broad Ltd’s financial report audit.

(b) Explain how an auditor would obtain more persuasive evidence for the relevant assertions for the bank accounts at Broad Ltd.