BENCHMARK SURVEY: Private Funds Audit Fees Survey
Starting in 2012, Barrington has completed three editions of our pioneering benchmarking survey for mutual fund audit fees. These surveys have been well received, and have provided an accurate tool for gaining transparency into how audit fees are determined.
Barrington is now modifying the survey to evaluate Private Funds:
- Hedge Funds
- Private Equity Funds
- Hybrid Funds (HF holdings with PE structure)
- Illiquid or Real Asset Funds
- Alternative fund of funds
- ERISA only funds
Private fund managers and boards can obtain an accurate comparison of audit fees paid and predicted costs …
The goal of this survey is to answer this central question, “Are audit fees within a reasonable range on a relative complexity factor?”
To answer that question, we developed a unique predictive model to examine and understand audit costs and cost drivers for dissimilar funds and fund complexes. Our model, which uses approximately 9,000 data points that we have accumulated since the survey’s introduction, is exceptionally correlated with predicted costs. The survey is auditor agnostic. Participants are provided with predicted and actual costs at the fund level.
… and compare the reasonableness of their firm’s audit fees with that of their peers.
- Firms can assess the appropriateness of both their overall and individual fund audit fees.
- Management can better understand the underlying cost drivers for fund audit fees.
- Private funds use the data from this survey to confirm or adjust the level of audit fees they negotiate.