Shawnee firm welcomes novel challenges from clients

By Don Mecoy

Published: August 10, 2006

SHAWNEE - Becoming the state’s largest accounting firm involves a willingness to take on unusual tasks.

“We had a client bring a semi-truck loaded with (accounting) documents that he’d been accumulating for two years,” said Richard Finley, partner of Finley & Cook PLLC. The firm’s staff tackled the chore on a triage basis, working around the clock to sort through the paperwork and organize it to meet the client’s accounting needs, Finley said.

“We’ve made a career out of being uncomfortable,” Finley said. “I always tell people that if you liked what we did, you’d do it yourself.”

The firm has doubled in size in the past four years with much of that growth coming from Indian tribal government work and casino gaming, a market niche that Finley & Cook discovered through its willingness to tackle extraordinary assignments, partner Janet Golay said.

“I tell them if it’s not illegal, immoral, unethical - because I won’t do any of those things - and you’re willing to pay for it, I’ll do it,” Golay said. “Consequently, it’s led us into a lot of areas where accounting firms ordinarily do not get into.”

Most of the company’s 150 employees are squeezed into every nook and cranny of a 27,000-square-foot converted Safeway store in downtown Shawnee. The audit department is in the basement of a refurbished downtown Shawnee hotel. Meanwhile, Finley & Cook plans to lease another 20,000 square feet of office space by year’s end.

Finley & Cook has about 1,200 clients including 55 banks and numerous oil and gas clients, including one that is publicly held. The firm also supports more than 150 software installations in 27 different states, including Alaska. And Finley & Cook serves more than 30 Indian tribes in some capacity.

The back of the headquarters building is a maze of offices and cubicles where workers reach into bags of documentation delivered daily by couriers from Indian casinos and verify, tally and record every hand of blackjack, every cash coupon and every machine pay-out.

Finley & Cook stores the reams of paper in an attached warehouse where the documents are readily available to auditors, who regularly visit the Shawnee business. The accounting also can raise flags for potential problems inside casinos, Golay said.

“We found one guy who won $470,000 in 10 days at one casino,” Golay said. “We thought we had found a problem, but when they looked at the videotapes they found that he’d actually paid in more than $470,000 playing high-dollar machines.”

Finley & Cook’s leadership said they’re not aware of any other state accounting firm that has plunged into the gaming business as it has.

The company’s enthusiasm over dealing with unique problems has been a hallmark since it was launched in 1947, said Finley, whose father, Drew Finley, was one of the firm’s founders.

“It’s something we’ve done for years and years and years, and something we’ve had to explain for years and years and years,” Finley said.

Outsourcing accounting can be boon to businesses big and small, but the principals at Finley & Cook seek to be more than just the bean counters, partner Terry Toole said.

“If there’s a decision to be made, we want our clients to feel like they should pick up the phone and call us,” Toole said. “A real active involvement with that proprietor has always been our mode of operation.”