What are Assurance Jobs?

Assurance, by definition, means to provide a certain degree of certainty of a future event by performing a study of related past events. Therefore, assurance jobs, especially financial assurance jobs, focus mainly on carefully studying a company’s past performances to ensure any financial commitment by investors.

Assurance is similar to an audit in terms of reviewing a company’s financial statements. However, it goes a step further because the purpose of auditing financial statements is to provide assurance to investors that the company in question not only correctly reported the financial statements but also is a worthwhile investment.

In assurance jobs, auditors need to look much deeper into the company than just the financial statements. Auditors need to become familiar with the company’s business, how the company is run, the strengths of the company, and what changes can be recommended to make the company a better investment.

Investors rely greatly on financial assurance before making an investment. An investor would not normally take the time neither the resources to dig deeply into a certain company’s past and present operations to discover if the company is a worthwhile investment. Therefore they need to rely on third party assurance reports to make an investment decision.

 

Job Requirements

While many assurance jobs require at least a year or two of similar experience, there are companies that accept entry level applicants with a degree in accountancy that specialises in auditing. Many companies prefer that their applicants be a chartered accountant (CA) to consider them for the position.

If considered for such a position, an applicant can look forward to additional trainings and seminars to be provided at the company’s expense. This can be considered as a perk as these trainings and seminars allow for the growth of the considered applicant and can open many doors to higher positions and compensation within the company.

 

Assurance Jobs Descriptions

Upon entering in this position, one would rarely be performing individually. The newly hired employee will normally be working as part of a team interviewing key contacts within a particular company and ensuring accuracy of presented data.

Financial assurance jobs are very similar to investigative work as such one would need to have the ability to dig deep within the company not only to confirm accuracy of data and to look for discrepancies or questionable items, but also to look for opportunities that can be recommended to investors.

In order to successfully perform a financial assurance job one will need a better insight of how businesses are run. A lot of businesses make use of different tactics and it is best that a newly hired applicant be totally familiar with these tactics in order to be able to identify them and see whether these have a positive or negative result for the business.

Assurance jobs have many different areas of expertise. These can be risk assessment, financial audit, government & public services, pension audits, and technology assurance to name just a few. Financial assurance is a somewhat complex world but after several years of experience, it can be very rewarding.