Office Depot 2004 Annual Report Download - page 46

44 |Office Depot 2004 Annual Report
REPORT OF INDEPENDENT REGISTERED PUBLIC ACCOUNTING FIRM
To the Board of Directors of Office Depot, Inc.:
We have audited management’s assessment, included in the
accompanying Management’s Report on Internal Control Over
Financial Reporting, that Office Depot, Inc. and subsidiaries (the
“Company”) maintained effective internal control over financial
reporting as of December 25, 2004, based on criteria estab-
lished in Internal Control—Integrated Framework issued by
the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the Treadway
Commission. The Company’s management is responsible for
maintaining effective internal control over financial reporting
and for its assessment of the effectiveness of internal control
over financial reporting. Our responsibility is to express an
opinion on management’s assessment and an opinion on the
effectiveness of the Company’s internal control over financial
reporting based on our audit.
We conducted our audit in accordance with standards of the
Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (United States).
Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to
obtain reasonable assurance about whether effective internal
control over financial reporting was maintained in all material
respects. Our audit included obtaining an understanding of
internal control over financial reporting, evaluating manage-
ment’s assessment, testing and evaluating the design and oper-
ating effectiveness of internal control, and performing such
other procedures as we considered necessary in the circum-
stances. We believe that our audit provides a reasonable basis
for our opinions.
A company’s internal control over financial reporting is a pro-
cess designed by, or under the supervision of, the company’s
principal executive and principal financial officers, or persons
performing similar functions, and effected by the company’s
board of directors, management, and other personnel to pro-
vide reasonable assurance regarding the reliability of financial
reporting and the preparation of financial statements for exter-
nal purposes in accordance with generally accepted account-
ing principles. A company’s internal control over financial
reporting includes those policies and procedures that (1) per-
tain to the maintenance of records that, in reasonable detail,
accurately and fairly reflect the transactions and dispositions of
the assets of the company; (2) provide reasonable assurance
that transactions are recorded as necessary to permit prepa-
ration of financial statements in accordance with generally
accepted accounting principles, and that receipts and expen-
ditures of the company are being made only in accordance with
authorizations of management and directors of the company;
and (3) provide reasonable assurance regarding prevention or
timely detection of unauthorized acquisition, use, or disposition
of the company’s assets that could have a material effect on the
financial statements.
Because of the inherent limitations of internal control over finan-
cial reporting, including the possibility of collusion or improper
management override of controls, material misstatements due
to error or fraud may not be prevented or detected on a timely
basis. Also, projections of any evaluation of the effectiveness of
the internal control over financial reporting to future periods are
subject to the risk that the controls may become inadequate
because of changes in conditions, or that the degree of com-
pliance with the policies or procedures may deteriorate.
In our opinion, management’s assessment that the Company
maintained effective internal control over financial reporting as
of December 25, 2004, is fairly stated, in all material respects,
based on the criteria established in Internal Control—Integrated
Framework issued by the Committee on Sponsoring Organiza-
tions of the Treadway Commission. Also in our opinion, the
Company maintained, in all material respects, effective internal
control over financial reporting as of December 25, 2004, based
on the criteria established in Internal Control—Integrated
Framework issued by the Committee on Sponsoring Organiza-
tions of the Treadway Commission.
We have also audited, in accordance with the standards of the
Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (United States),
the consolidated financial statements as of and for the year
ended December 25, 2004 of the Company and our report
dated March 7, 2005 expressed an unqualified opinion on those
financial statements.
Certified Public Accountants
Fort Lauderdale, Florida
March 7, 2005