Auditors are responsible for the analysis and verification of a company’s financial records and statements. An auditor must acquire their information from all available sources, and use it to determine whether the company is being honest about their financial status, or if there are any discrepancies in the information provided by them. Auditors usually approach this by comparing the records provided by the company to those available by other institutions, such as banks and clients/partners of the company. An auditor may work either freely on his own accord, or on a permanent basis with a company.
Auditors are required to have some formal education in finances and/or accounting – at least a Bachelor’s degree in either will be needed in order to qualify, and the candidate must possess various other skills as well – for example, good mathematics, a good understanding of the current market, as well as properly judging people (in order to determine when somebody may be lying to get out of a tricky situation). Auditors usually start off from working in public firms that deal with accounting, from where they can progress to becoming an actual auditor.
An auditor can earn with great variations depending on their type of employment. The general payment goes between $40,000 – $60,000, with internal auditors earning noticeably more than those working on a free-based employment. This isn’t a strict correlation though, as some external auditors are able to earn substantially more than the average internal one.