Call for Tender – External Audit NW Syria

Terms of Reference (TOR) for an External Audit

1. Introduction

arche noVa e.V. is a non-profit organization with headquarter in Germany. It runs projects in Asia, Middle East and Africa in the field of humanitarian aid, with a special focus on WASH. It cooperates with partner organizations in the countries but also has their own team in field offices implementing the projects.

Its main donors are GFFO and BMZ and also receives private donations.

The project described below is supposed to be audited by an external independent audit agency.

2. Description of the project and audit key points

Project title: Multisectoral humanitarian Aid for people in need in informal settlements, IDP and host communities affected by the crisis in Syria

Implementing Organisation: arche noVa in cooperation with partner organizations

Project Outcome: The resilience of 6,400 IDP and host community households in need of humanitarian assistance has improved through the distribution of food and relief items, the provision of heatable temporary shelters, and safe access to water and sanitation facilities

Project Duration: 01.01.2022 – 31.12.2023

Project Donor: The German Federal Foreign Office (GFFO)

Project budget: 4.592.000 EUR, 2022: 2.342.000 EUR, 2023: 2.250.000 EUR

Funds from donor: 4.500.000 EUR

Time period for audit: 01.01.2024 – 28.02.2024

Place of audit: Gaziantep

Audit costs: Around 10.000 EUR

Application submission: Deadline 22.12.2023

[email protected]

3. Description of cooperation with partner organization

• Bonyan: Has been implementing projects in the areas of WASH and food distribution since 2004, primarily in Northwest Syria and the region around Aleppo. Among the clients were IOM, UNICEF, UNDP or GIZ. Bonyan has already cooperated with arche noVa in two projects
• Takaful Al Sham: TAS has been implementing multi-sectoral humanitarian assistance to refugees, IDPs, as well as host communities in Syria and Turkey since 2013. TAS currently employs a total of more than 400 field staff in Syria. Major donor agencies include UNICEF, WFP, DER, GIZ, IOM, Islamic relief, Chemonics, Sida, among others.

4. Audit purpose

The aim is to examinate arche noVa´s financial records and operations to ensure that there are no cases of fraud, embezzlement, or genuine errors from individuals within the organization. Furthermore, the audit should provide useful information in identifying further needs and applicable lessons learnt according to organization capacities.

5. Audit process

The audit agency will be selected and provided with all information needed, for instance: financial software used, contacts of staff members of financial team, internal financial guidelines, financial reports, etc.

The agency will have access to all folders with vouchers and will examine them. Arche NoVa´s financial team will be available for upcoming questions during the entire audit process.

In the end of the audit, the agency will provide an audit report for the organization which will be shared with the donor.

6. Users of the audit

User of this audit will be

1. Primary User: arche noVa
   1. Senior Management and Financial team in the field and headquarter
   2. Program Management at HQ level
2. Secondary User: Donor

7. Deliveries

The audit agency will be expected to submit the following documents:

1. Draft audit report: This should include
   1. the executive summary
   2. findings
   3. recommendations and
   4. Conclusions.
2. Feedback discussion session: Before the final report is issued, the agency should hold a feedback discussion session with the financial team and programme team of the organization. The aim of this session is to receive feedback/clarifications/explanations on findings and preliminary conclusions and recommendations. The session will focus also on lessons learnt and good practices for future programming.
3. Final report: The final report is to be submitted after feedback has been received and integrated into the draft report. Further, the audit agency should provide all of the data collection in the form of Excel sheet.

All deliveries shall be English.

8. Resources

Following resources will be provided:

1. Project proposal
2. Project agreement, including budget
3. Any changes to the budget
4. Donor´s funding guidelines
5. All project-relevant receipts (transfer of funds, exchange, etc)
6. All project-relevant contracts (personnel, service/ supplier contracts, rental agreements, etc)
7. All relevant contract award documentation
8. Further project-relevant documents requested during the course of the external audit
9. Financial team contacts for upcoming questions
10. Project financial reports (internal and external reports)
11. Organizational documents (such as internal procurement guidelines, etc)
12. Others

9. Timetable and Workplan

The auditor is requested to fill in the table (Annex 1), listing suggested dates for each task of the audit (the content can be adjusted according to the plannings). Furthermore, a detailed workplan breakdown is to be provided.

10. Contract length

It is anticipated that the length of time to be taken to complete the audit, including preparation, site visit and reporting will be no more than 30 working days.

11. Technical proposal

The applicant should present a technical proposal, reflecting the audit tasks, including (at least):

1. Understanding of the TOR
2. Organizational experience and capacity to fulfil the tasks
3. Description and breakdown of the planned evaluation team members (including CVs of main auditor)
4. Filled in timetable (see above)
5. Detailed workplan including methods

12. Profile of the audit agency

The profile of the desired team members should include:

• Main consultants to be fluent in English, field team to be fluent in Arabic (field coordinator/team leader to have basic English skills)
• Relevant experience in conducting audits of similar projects
• Familiarity with the Humanitarian context
• Applicant have to be accredited as audit agency