Coreintegra Consulting Services Limited payroll audit gap in FY26

Coreintegra Consulting Services Limited disclosed that its payroll software had no database-level audit trail in FY24 and that the feature did not operate throughout FY25 and FY26. In FY26, Spine was the only one of five named accounting systems without an enabled audit trail, while auditors also excepted daily payroll backups on a server located in India.

Why did Coreintegra’s payroll audit trail gap persist through FY26?

Coreintegra’s payroll audit trail gap persisted because the audit reports identified payroll software as an exception in each of the three financial years ended March 31, 2024, March 31, 2025 and March 31, 2026. An audit trail, also described in the reports as an edit log, is a software feature for recording changes. For FY24, the auditors said the feature was not enabled at the database level for software used in payroll processing.

The FY24 finding was reported for Coreintegra and Coreintegra Global Services Private Limited. For other relevant transactions, the auditors said the accounting software used had an audit-trail feature that operated throughout FY24. The reports therefore separated payroll processing from the remaining accounting software covered by their test checks.

The wording changed after FY24, but the disclosed exception remained. For FY25 and FY26, the audit reports said the audit-trail feature in the payroll software did not operate throughout the year. The supplied material does not state when the feature ceased operating in either year, whether it was enabled after March 31, 2026, or whether a remediation programme was completed.

What did the FY25 and FY26 audit reports say about Coreintegra’s payroll controls?

The FY25 and FY26 reports said Coreintegra’s payroll audit trail did not operate throughout each year, while identifying no instance of tampering with an enabled trail during the audit. The FY25 report said audit trails enabled in other software were preserved in line with statutory record-retention requirements. That statement applied to software in which the feature had been enabled, not to the payroll exception.

Coreintegra Global Services Private Limited received the same FY25 and FY26 payroll observation. The repeated finding across the parent and the named subsidiary means the disclosure covered payroll records at two entities for two consecutive years, following the FY24 database-level finding. The reports say the auditors’ examination included test checks, rather than providing a count of payroll records tested.

The disclosed control issue is distinct from a finding that payroll data had been altered. In FY25 and FY26, the auditors said they had not come across an instance of an enabled audit-trail feature being tampered with. However, the same reports expressly said that the payroll audit trail did not operate throughout the relevant year, which limits the scope of an edit-log record for that software.

How concentrated was Coreintegra’s payroll audit trail gap in FY26?

Coreintegra’s FY26 software schedule shows that the audit-trail gap was concentrated in Spine, the payroll system. Four of five listed systems, or 80%, had audit trails enabled, while Spine was marked “No.” The five-system list provides the clearest disclosed comparison of the payroll software with the rest of the accounting applications.

Tally Prime covered several transaction categories in FY26, whereas Spine was specifically identified as the payroll system. The fact that four systems had enabled trails does not remove the payroll exception, because the auditors separately reported it in FY24, FY25 and FY26. On the terms used in the FY25 and FY26 reports, resolution would require the payroll audit trail to operate throughout the relevant year.

What was the separate India-based payroll backup exception?

The India-based backup exception concerned daily copies of payroll software data and was reported separately from the edit-log issue in FY25 and FY26. For both years, the auditors said Coreintegra had kept proper books of account as required by law, except for daily backup of payroll software on a server located in India. The reports for Coreintegra Global Services Private Limited contained the same exception in FY25 and FY26.

A daily backup and an audit trail are different software-control mechanisms. The reports describe the audit trail as an edit-log facility, while the backup observation concerns the daily preservation of payroll software data on an India-based server. The supplied disclosure does not state whether backups were held outside India, how often any alternative backup occurred, or whether the location issue was corrected after March 31, 2026.

The persistence of the backup exception across FY25 and FY26 is relevant because it was reported alongside the payroll edit-log issue for both entities. However, the material does not quantify payroll data, payroll transactions, affected employees or any loss of records. It also does not state that the backup exception caused a financial-statement misstatement.

Did the payroll software finding change Coreintegra’s restated profits?

The payroll-control and backup qualifications did not require corrective adjustments to Coreintegra’s restated consolidated financial information. The document places the FY24, FY25 and FY26 audit-report matters within non-adjusting items. It therefore presents the software and backup observations as audit exceptions rather than quantified revisions to revenue, expenses or profit arising from payroll processing.

Coreintegra’s restated consolidated profit after tax was Rs 4.94 crore for FY24, Rs 3.46 crore for FY25 and Rs 4.51 crore for FY26. FY25 profit was Rs 1.48 crore below FY24, before FY26 profit increased by Rs 1.05 crore. The restatement disclosures do not attribute either movement to Spine, the audit-trail gap or the India-based backup exception.

The restatement schedule identifies prior-period revenue, employee-benefit expenses, depreciation, gratuity and current or prior-period tax provisions as adjustment categories. FY24 had the largest listed net profit-and-loss adjustment at Rs 48.45 lakh, compared with a negative Rs 30.87 lakh in FY25 and Rs 1.82 lakh in FY26. These accounting adjustments should not be treated as effects of the payroll-control qualification because the document does not make that connection.

Conclusion

Coreintegra disclosed a payroll-specific operating-control gap over three financial years. Spine had no database-level edit-log facility in FY24 and did not have an audit trail operating throughout FY25 or FY26, while four of five systems listed in FY26 had trails enabled. The disclosure also records a separate daily India-based payroll-backup exception in FY25 and FY26 for both Coreintegra and Coreintegra Global Services Private Limited.

The next disclosure to watch is a later audit report stating that Spine’s audit trail operated throughout the year and that daily payroll backups were maintained on a server located in India. The supplied material contains no corrective plan, completion date or post-March 31, 2026 update, so subsequent audit reporting would be needed to establish whether either exception has been resolved.