A&E firms
FAR overhead, without the fog.
Architecture and engineering firms that work for public agencies live and die by an indirect cost rate. The audit is not the hard part. The chart of accounts is.
A FAR overhead audit asks a simple question in a language built for the Department of Defense: what does it cost this firm to keep the lights on, and which of those costs may a government owner reimburse?
Florida architecture and engineering firms meet this question when FDOT, a county, or a prime contractor asks for an audited overhead rate before they ask for the work. The number is not a feeling. It is a ratio — indirect costs over a direct-labor base — prepared to the Federal Acquisition Regulation and the cost principles that travel with it.
Where rates come apart
They come apart on unallowables that felt like ordinary business: interest, entertainment, parts of business development, certain legal costs, and the personal expenses that have a way of sitting in “miscellaneous.” They come apart when the labor base is sloppy — principals who are sometimes direct and sometimes overhead, without a timesheet that can defend the split. They come apart when the firm’s QuickBooks file was built for a bank, not for a contracting officer.
The cleanest audits we do begin a year earlier than the year under audit, with a chart of accounts that already knows the difference.
What we do
Forrest Robinson prepares FAR-compliant overhead audits for architecture and engineering firms. We know the schedule, the unallowable list, and the difference between a rate that is right and a rate that is merely hoped for. If your next pursuit depends on a number a public agency will accept, that is a conversation to have before the RFP, not after the first rejection.
This is not an engagement letter. Overhead rates are fact-specific. If you need the work, we will scope it as a proper attest engagement.