D.Comm. / Accurate, credible and reliable financial reporting is critical for the effective functioning of the world’s capital markets and the protection of the interests of stakeholders, who rely on such information for their decision making. All the well- known corporate collapses of the 21st century have in common fraudulent financial reporting, unscrupulous management practices and the fact that they all had audit committees consisting of well-known and respected people. This state of events highlighted the fact that audit committees should not merely exist as window-dressing, but should be effective in their functioning. Audit committees will thus only be of value if they are properly constituted, are functioning effectively and if their role is clearly understood by all the parties concerned. This study’s research problem was to analyse the effective functioning of audit committees in the modern business environment, and the study aimed to investigate the factors and events that impact on the development, status and effective functioning of audit committees at large listed companies in South Africa. This was done through a comprehensive literature study of the factors impacting on audit committees and the empirical testing thereof at the largest listed companies in South Africa. The study found that audit committees are well established, properly constituted, have the authority and resources to effectively discharge their responsibilities and consist of members who act independently and who have the right mix of appropriate experience, financial literacy and financial expertise amongst their members. The audit committee’s role was found to be generally well understood and supported by the board and the Chief Financial Officers. It was further found that the audit committees are effective in discharging their oversight responsibilities on the board’s behalf, with the only real exception being their effectiveness regarding IT-related aspects. However, audit committee reporting in annual reports was found to be of a poor standard and did not reflect the iii actual workings and effectiveness of the committee. It was also found that the audit committee’s perceived responsibilities are evolving and that audit committee members’ legal liabilities are increasing. The research findings make a valuable contribution to the existing body of knowledge on current audit committee practices and developments. The study also outlines new responsibilities for future audit committees, as well as aspects that should be addressed in future legislation, regulations, corporate governance codes and best practice standards for audit committees.

Read the abstract in the section 00front of this document. / Dissertation (MEng (Environmental Engineering))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Chemical Engineering / unrestricted

Electronic Commerce (EC) is a growing business option and due to the “openness” of the underlying technologies used for EC, introduces new risks and new technologies that require sophisticated and sometimes very technical controls to be implemented. The role of the IS auditors is to ensure that they are technically competent to understand the impact of new technologies on the control environment and at the same time IS auditors need to be able to communicate the audit results to non-technical management. In this study the following framework, supported by detailed information and procedures for each step, is provided to assist the IS auditor to formulate an appropriate audit approach for an EC payment security audit: <ul> <li>-- Gathering of background information related to EC payment security.</li> <li>-- Highlighting the risks in this environment.</li> <li>-- Identifying possible controls that will minimise the risks.</li> <li>-- Attending to various audit considerations that should be addressed by the IS auditor (these considerations are based on the underlying technologies, general controls, and ED-specific issues e.g., PKI, digital certificates, etc.</li> </ul> The study highlighted the fact that the IS auditors should understand that they can not be experts in all the different technologies related to EC payment security. They should, however, equip themselves with the knowledge to understand the risks involved with new technologies and they should have a sufficiently in depth background exposure to technology to understand the controls required to address the risks. Results of previous audit procedures also play a significant role in shaping the IS auditor’s approach when auditing in an EC payment security environment. This thesis provides the IS auditor with a holistic approach to an EC payment security audit. After considering and implementing the elements of the framework developed in this study in an EC payment security audit, the IS auditor has to perform the actual audit tests, evaluate the results, and report the finding. Detailed audit considerations have also been provided to assist the IS auditor in collecting information and in developing an audit program. Copyright 2002, University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria. Please cite as follows: Bezuidenhout, PS 2002, An audit approach of the information systems auditor in an electronic commerce environment with emphasis on internet payment security, MCom dissertation, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, viewed yymmdd < http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-08222005-120314/ > / Dissertation (MCom (Computer Auditing))--University of Pretoria, 2006. / Auditing / unrestricted

Governments all over the world are faced with numerous challenges while running their countries on a daily basis. The predominant challenges which arise are those which involve statistical methodologies. Official statistics to South Africa’s infrastructure are very important and because of this it is important that an effort is made to reduce the challenges that occur during the development of official statistics. For official statistics to be developed successfully quality standards need to be built into an organisational framework and form a system of architecture (Statistics New Zealand 2009:1). Therefore, this study seeks to develop a statistical methodology that is appropriate and scientifically correct using an automated statistical system for audits in government regulatory authorities. The study makes use of Mathematica to provide guidelines on how to develop and use an automated statistical audit system. A comprehensive literature study was conducted using existing secondary sources. A quantitative research paradigm was adopted for this study, to empirically assess the demographic characteristics of tenants of Social Housing Estates and their perceptions towards the rental units they inhabit. More specifically a descriptive study was undertaken. Furthermore, a sample size was selected by means of convenience sampling for a case study on SHRA to assess the respondent’s biographical information. From this sample, a pilot study was conducted investigating the general perceptions of the respondents regarding the physical conditions and quality of their units. The technical development of an automated statistical audit system was discussed. This process involved the development and use of a questionnaire design tool, statistical analysis and reporting and how Mathematica software served as a platform for developing the system. The findings of this study provide insights on how government regulatory authorities can best utilise automated statistical audits for regulation purposes and achieved this by developing an automated statistical audit system for government regulatory authorities. It is hoped that the findings of this study will provide government regulatory authorities with practical suggestions or solutions regarding the generating of official statistics for regulatory purposes, and that the suggestions for future research will inspire future researchers to further investigate automated statistical audit systems, statistical analysis, automated questionnaire development, and government regulatory authorities individually.

Auditors perform a very important task within the context of the affairs of a company because financial reporting can only serve its purpose if stakeholders can rely on its accuracy and reliability. An auditor’s duty is to opine whether an entity’s financial reporting has been done according to the requirements of the law. The responsibility of reporting according to the law lies with an entity’s directors. Auditors cannot issue an absolute assurance as to the lawfulness and reliability of an entity’s financial reporting. However when it is subsequently discovered that the financial reporting was incorrect and that fraud has occurred auditors are often blamed and sued for enormous amounts of money for failing to detect material anomalies in the financial reports. These actions are based on the fact that auditors have a duty to exercise reasonable care and skill in the performance of their duties and through their failure to act as such, have caused financial harm to the clients or third parties. The fact that auditors are only required by law to exercise reasonable care and skill and perform an audit according to the standards of the reasonable auditor and not the most meticulous one, is often not regarded or is sometimes deliberately ignored. This clearly represents a problem in our law, namely that the presence of fraud in financial reports does not in itself suggest negligence on the part of the auditor but is apparently often perceived to do so. This research shows that the auditor’s duty of reasonable care and skill does not necessarily entail the duty to detect fraud. The elements of the duty of reasonable care and skill are identified from case law, legislation and international auditing standards. In order to limit the liability of auditors in general it is important to focus also on the elements of fault (negligence), wrongfulness and causation. This research shows that negligence cannot be established merely by the presence of fraud or material misstatements in financial statements. The responsibility for fair financial reporting lies with the directors. This research gives prominence to this fact which often seems to be ignored for convenience and in order to place the blame on the auditors. This research implicitly asks the question, why are auditors being held responsible for material misstatements in a company’s financial statements and not the directors? Guidelines for determining the extent of an auditor’s liability in this regard are formulated in this research.

En el presente trabajo de investigación, analizaremos cómo la prescripción actúa como un límite temporal frente a la facultad de fiscalización y determinación con la que cuenta la Administración Tributaria. / Trabajo de investigación

This diploma paper is amed on the area of external audit and it's purpose is to present audit profession from theoretical and practical side. The paper is divided into three parts, where the first two parts introduce theoretical background, historical development of audit profession, relation of external and internal audit and the most important legal rules and regulations, which concern the area of audit. Besides this basic information is also mentioned the new bill about auditors, which has to implement European Commission Directive, considerating compulsory audit of final account, into Czech system of law. The third part is practical, and shows how audit works on particular contract.

This diploma work deals with Continuous audit of financial statements. The goal of this work is to describe chosen methods and procedures of this kind of audit. The first part of the text belongs to the description of laws and rules accordind to financial accounting and financial audit. Procedures and methods used in financial audit are described in the second part of the text. I was able to gain such a knowledge of these procedures and methods while working as an assistant of financial auditor in Cyech Republic. This work should be useful for anyone who is thinking about becoming a financial auditor, or an assistant.

This thesis focused on procedures of auditor when assure consolidated financial statements prepared in accordance with IAS/IFRS. The aim is to summarise different issues starting with preparing annual financial statements and finalising with auditorś report disclosure.

The financial statements represent a comprehensive and standardized document including financial information about the company. The companies need to publish this document in the Collection of Deeds, and since the documents are submitted to the Collection of Deeds in electronic form and are subsequently freely available, any financial statements are generally available to a wide range of potential users. Users of the financial statements can be divided based on their relation to the financial statements and based on level of their knowledge of accounting. The confidence of users in information disclosed in the financial statements is higher, in case the financial statements were subject to audit. The user of the financial statements does not have a possibility of detailed verification of the information presented in it (he cannot inquire the management of the company, inspect the original accounting documents, etc.). In this case, the audit represents ensuring correctness of the information presented in the financial statements and also assurance that the financial statements were subject to the independent verification. These facts enhance the degree of confidence of intended users in the financial statements and this is also the purpose of an audit as defined by the International Standards on Auditing. In accordance with the International Standards on Auditing the auditor expects that the user of the financial statements has reasonable knowledge of accounting and is willing to study the financial statements with reasonable effort. Auditor performs his testing based on certain materiality level that does not have to agree to the materiality level of the user. The risk represents in this case the situation, when the materiality level of the user is lower than the materiality level determined by the auditor. The user of the financial statements has limited possibilities to verify the information in it, however, he is able to verify the link among information presented in different parts of the financial statements and confront the financial statements with other relevant information available. My dissertation consists from theoretical and practical part. In the theoretical part, there are possible verifications described that can be performed by the user of the financial statements and in the practical part, there are the mentioned procedures applied to financial statements of four domestic companies. The subject of my research was financial statements for the years 2006 to 2009. The aim was not only the identification of the risks in the financial statements from the users' point of view, but also monitoring of the development of financial statements in time. The subject of the dissertation was also the verification of the formal correctness of audit reports issued to the selected financial statements (I am registered as Czech statutory auditor by the Chamber of Auditors of the Czech Republic and therefore I am able to perform this verification). The subject of the dissertation was not the verification of the factual correctness of the audit report, this verification is in principle not possible without possibility to look into the audit file. During analysis of selected financial statements I have identified several areas that represent risk of misstatement in the financial statements from the users' point of view. It related mainly to going concern issues, issues relating to completeness of reserves and provisions and risk of possible overvaluation of finance investments and related receivables to subsidiaries. The user of the financial statements should for his better understanding therefore look for other information relating to the company from freely available resources and perform comparison with financial statements of other companies in the same industry. The risks mentioned above were not sufficiently commented in the notes to the financial statements and that subsequently gives a rise to questions on financial statements users' side and lowers his confidence in information presented in the financial statements. I think that there is a change in the audit approach necessary, it should not be enough just that the financial statements are free from material misstatement; the financial statements should not give a rise to additional questions from their users.