Who this is for: Needs Manage My Audit Templates.
Optional fields sit below the fixed ones in ② Audit Details. Switch on only what the audit genuinely needs — every field you add is one more thing the auditor has to complete.
Field | Switch it on when |
Business Context | The audit covers a specific business unit and the reader needs background on it |
Scope | You want a short description of what the audit covers. To state its limits precisely, use Boundaries and Exclusions |
Objectives | You want to record what the audit sets out to achieve |
Boundaries | You need to state exactly what is in scope — the areas, processes and period covered |
Exclusions | Something is deliberately left out, and the reader needs to know what and why |
Audit Period | The audit covers a date range rather than a point in time — for example Q1 2026 |
Auditees | You need a record of who was audited or spoken to — common in certification audits |
Audit Methodology | It matters how the audit was done: interview, document review, site walk, or a mix |
Risk Rating | You classify the subject area's risk before auditing it, to help prioritise |
Audit Plan | You want a short plan for the audit itself — sampling approach, logistics and expected outputs — or to link to your own plan |
Each field you switch on appears immediately as a blue chip under OPTIONAL FIELDS in the live preview, so you can see the auditor's view of the form as you build it.
Off, On or Required. Objectives, Boundaries and Exclusions can each be set to Off, On or Required. A Required field shows an asterisk and must be filled in before the audit can be published. The other optional fields, including Audit Plan, are just Off or On. See Recording objectives, boundaries and exclusions for an audit and Adding an audit plan and sampling approach to an audit.
Changes apply to new audits. A field you switch on appears on audits started after you publish the template. You can't change a template while one of its audits is in progress (the builder says so and greys out Publish Template), so finish those audits first, or duplicate the template.
A practical starting point: for a certification-style internal audit, switch on Objectives, Boundaries, Exclusions, Audit Methodology and Auditees, and consider Audit Plan. For a short site inspection, leave them all off.
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