The results of Protiviti’s latest SOX compliance survey are in, and one takeaway in particular – cost of SOX compliance – may be music to the ears of some companies. For many organizations, those costs were reported to be lower this year than last, even as the number of controls, as well as hours dedicated to compliance, increased.
We don’t know the specific reasons why the costs at some companies decreased but we have some reasonable guesses: The fact that many companies have now completed their adoption of the new COSO Internal Control – Integrated Framework most certainly is a factor. The cost of the COSO implementation work was estimated to be between $50,000 and $100,000 on average.
Another potential factor regarding costs is who, exactly, is doing the work. As we illustrate in our infographic, a majority of organizations either outsource or co-source SOX compliance activities. This, in effect, may be masking some SOX compliance costs, as the expense for these external resources may not be captured under direct SOX costs the organization is tracking.
One other important point: The downward cost trend is not across the board – in fact, the overall number of companies spending over $2 million annually rose this year compared to last.
In addition, we wanted to get some further insight into why some companies report increasing controls, as well as increased hours and costs, so we introduced a new parameter in our survey this year – number of unique locations per company. Not surprisingly, the results revealed that the more locations a company has, the higher the number of controls it has and the higher its SOX costs are. This trend is quite clear, and it should help companies plan for their SOX costs next year, based on their plans to expand, reduce, or keep the same their number of unique locations.
Another trend driving hours and costs up is the dynamic nature of the SOX controls environment. With regulatory changes and developments constantly in play – PCAOB, new revenue recognition standard, cybersecurity, SOC 1, etc. – the learning curve seems to always be up, dragging hours up as well.
I’ve just highlighted the top trends here. The survey report provides much more granular insights, by type and size of company, type of control environment and more. Interest in benchmarking and peer performance with regard to SOX compliance is strong, and we are confident that the survey report provides a useful benchmark with detailed numbers and explanations. Download the survey report here and watch our highlights video below.
[wpvideo jY0diccR]
