Sox: expense worth it

The cost of complying with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in most cases appears to be matched by the effectiveness of improving risk management, according to a survey by RevenueRecognition.com and International Data Corp.

While the survey of 220 businesses found this to be the case for activities such as documenting accounting policies, certification and sign off on internal controls, certification of financial statements, and responding to external audit attestation processes, there were two exceptions. Respondents rated the cost of documenting internal controls “substantially higher” than its effectiveness for improving risk management, while they rated the cost of remediation of weaknesses “substantially lower” than its effectiveness for improving risk management.