Opinion Letter Sample: Fill & Download for Free

Big disclaimer: I am just one lowly recruiter. There are a lot of other people in my profession and I don't speak for us all. But what I'm about to say is what I feel is an accurate sample size of what most of my peers in my field can all agree on.Hard truth on this one: absolutely not. Not only do we not usually read them, most of the time we don't even open that attachment or give cover letters a cursory glance. It's such a waste of time. Many companies have even stopped asking for them altogether.But I'll tell you who DOES read cover letters: hiring managers. Not all. In fact, a lot don't, but in the entire hiring equation, were I to assign likelihood, a hiring manager is more prone to read the cover letter than anyone else involved. And even then, I'd add another factor that narrows the field - hiring managers at small companies with lower hiring volume (like a small non-profit) are more likely to read a cover letter than a hiring manager at companies like Amazon or KPMG.In my opinion, if you want your cover letter to be read, do these things:Don't apply online but email your resume to a recruiter or hiring manager instead.Don't make it an actual "letter." Instead, make it the body of the email with your resume attached. When people attach a letter AND a resume to an email, let me just say only one attachment is getting opened, and it's always the resume. So don't even bother.Keep it short and to the point. Like seriously, five sentences is all that's necessary. If you're in sales or something maybe a few bullet points. But no multiple paragraphs. Long cover letters are simply not going to get read.Tailor it. Get the name of the company right in the cover letter. When I did campus recruiting for new grads at Expedia, 1 out of 2 times, the candidate got this wrong. They were applying to companies at such volume it wasn't uncommon to see "I'm excited about the possibility of an opportunity at Microsoft or Google or some other company that was not the company for which I worked."Inject some personality into it...please. If your cover letter sounds like that of everyone else, you have completely defeated the purpose.Similar to "objectives" on a resume, cover letters are a bit of a throwback to another era in job hunting where we didn't have fancy applicant tracking systems that connected a candidate's application with a tangible job/requisition. But for some reason we want to continue this exercise, so we may as well do it with more flair. I would also say cover letter requirements are industry specific. In tech one of the more evolved industries, I feel like they're totally unnecessary. That may not be the case in finance or management consulting, or any of the "bedrock" industries.

The two important things for SBA and the bank, is your credit and collateral. Then your application consists of the business plan. and the agent will be assigned to you and help you. Hopefully you have a track record of other business. Of course, they will be asking you the purpose of the loan. You may need to show samples of receipts for proof of the expenses of your income statements. The income should be reviewed by an accountant and issue an opinion letter. But go to Small Business Administration for a more up to date situation and a roster for SCORE, they can help you in completing the application.

There are lots of very good accounting firms that offer corporate auditing services. The Big 4 have consolidated from what used to be called the Big 8. They are the largest accounting firms and have international operations. Choosing one over the other would come down to whether their offices overlap with a companies operations geographically, price, timing, and whether a CFO feels a comfortable relationship with the accountants handling the audit.Here is more general information on the role of auditors and the process.The Role of AuditorsAs per the SEC requirements and regulations, in order to be eligible to be traded on a U.S. stock exchange, a publicly traded company’s financials must be prepared by the company and then reviewed and audited by an outside Certified Public Accountant (CPA).What is an auditor?The auditing process entails reviewing the financial statements prepared and drafted by the company to make sure they conform to GAAP and other rules. The auditors also “test” the numbers by requesting and reviewing supporting documentation such as invoices, checks, bills, and contracts. They send letters to the company’s banks to confirm bank balances and contact lawyers the company has worked with to confirm that there are no liabilities or lawsuits pending that have not been disclosed.The Auditing ProcessIn a company, performance is paramount. There are strong temptations to commit fraud for personal gain or to make the numbers look better.People who run companies have the power to exploit financial information for personal gain. For publicly traded companies annual auditing is a legal requirement. The investors of many privately held companies, including their bankers, also require annual audited financial statements.The audit process is designed to protect against misrepresenting financial information to improve results, avoid taxation, hide fraud, or not report latent liabilities. Audits are a process of gaining information about the financial systems and the financial records of a company.Financial audits are performed to ascertain the validity and reliability of information, as well as to provide an assessment of the company’s internal control system. Audits are carried out by a third party impartial account that is certified as a CPA.What does it take to be an auditor?To work on other company’s financials you must be a CPA. In the United States a CPA will have passed the Uniform Certified Public Accountant Examination and met additional state education and experience requirements for membership in their state’s professional accounting body. You don’t have to be a CPA to work for a company internally as an employee in accounting or finance. You can be a CFO and not be a CPA.Since the auditor cannot feasibly know or discover everything about a company, an audit seeks to provide reasonable assurance that the financial statements are free from material error. Test work and sampling of documents is performed in audits as a way to statistically confirm that the company has done the accounting properly.A set of financial statements is understood to be ‘true and fair’ when they are deemed free of material misstatements. The auditor confirms this in their opinion letter that precedes the financials in the presentation. The opinion given on financial statements depends on the audit evidence obtained. You find the opinion letter at the beginning of the audited financial statements.You can review the audited financial statements of publicly traded companies on the SEC website under the EDGAR tab. Look for the company’s most recent 10K filing.