account receivable

You are the audit senior on the newly appointed audit engagement of Speed Stores (Pty) Ltd (Speed Stores) for its financial year ended 31 December 2021. The company is a retailer of footwear in South Africa. Three years ago, the company opened 20 new branches outside Johannesburg, their initial market. The expansion was made possible because of an investment by an investment bank called Pro Investment Ltd, which acquired a majority stake in the company. The new branches include two in Botswana. The company is also planning to open an additional 25 branches over the next two years which will make a total of 50 branches from the initial 5 branches only. The company's previous auditors resigned as they felt that they were not able to properly service the client anymore due to Speed Stores' rapid growth and expansion. The audit firm you work for was only appointed as the auditor of Speed Stores in November 2021 and was therefore unable to perform an interim audit. The following additional information is available to you as at year-end: - Speed Stores sells to its customers on cash and credit. - The credit terms granted to each customer are based on the customer's disposable income as per his/her salary payslip, less monthly expenses estimated by the customer. - Speed Stores and other retailers have been forced to increase their sales prices during the 2021 calendar year because of an increase in operating costs. The increase in the selling price has resulted in an increase in the number of customers defaulting on their monthly debt repayments. - The logic used by Speed Stores to calculate the allowance for the doubtful debts figure was questioned by the previous auditor but did not result in a modified audit opinion. - The company makes use of a fully integrated, computerised point-of-sales system. Sneed Stores' accounts receivable master file contains the following fields: You are required to: 1.1 Discuss the assertions that would require the most audit focus for Speed Stores