In the first survey of its kind on audit quality, 89 percent of audit partners said audit staff comprising managers and trainees is the most important factor for audit quality, followed by 73 percent who chose audit committees and 60 percent who selected audit fee. The survey was conducted by the Audit Oversight Board (AOB) in February-March this year. The survey was sent to 296 audit partners from 102 audit firms registered with AOB and the response rate was 65 percent.
A little over 70 percent partners selected that minimum qualification for trainees other than the CA trainees should be a professional qualification, such as ACCA and ICMA. The majority was of the view that compensation being paid to managers and trainees is appropriate. Regarding audit committees, 84 percent of respondents agreed that a report by audit committees should be included in the company's annual report, 53 percent said that audit committees lacked sufficient accounting knowledge, and 98 percent favoured a structured training course for audit committee members. Respondents also emphasized the role of audit committee in risk management and that a risk register should be maintained and reviewed by the audit committee.
As many as 80 percent audit partners see audit fee paid by public interest companies as low.AOB is the independent regulator established by the parliament in 2016 in line with international practices. Its purpose is to oversee audit quality of public interest companies, which include listed companies and non-listed public sector companies. Only the auditors registered with AOB may audit the financial statements of a public interest company. The results of this survey are available on the AOB's website. AOB will continue its engagement with all relevant stakeholders to improve audit quality of public interest companies.-PR
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