AI Finance and Accounting Safety Checklist

Use This Checklist Before Using AI in Finance or Accounting

AI can help finance and accounting teams draft, summarize, organize, and prepare. Before using AI-assisted output, check source data, privacy, controls, approvals, and qualified review requirements.

The Checklist

• Workflow: Is AI supporting bookkeeping, invoices, expenses, reports, budgets, cash flow, tax document organization, AP/AR, audit prep, or controls?
• Source data: Has the output been checked against accounting systems, bank records, invoices, receipts, payroll files, reports, or source documents?
• Privacy: Does the input include bank data, payroll information, tax identifiers, customer financial data, vendor data, or confidential business information?
• Tool approval: Is the AI tool approved for this financial information and workflow?
• Controls: Does the workflow preserve approvals, segregation of duties, audit trails, and review steps?
• Decision risk: Could the output affect tax, audit, payroll, lending, investing, reporting, payments, approvals, or financial strategy?
• Qualified review: Has the responsible finance, accounting, tax, audit, legal, or management reviewer approved the final output?

The Rule

Use AI to draft and organize, but keep qualified people responsible for final numbers, filings, controls, approvals, tax positions, audit conclusions, payroll, reporting, and financial decisions.