The thesis deals with the milestones in the development of accounting and auditing. In four chapters, which are sorted chronologically, the thesis tries to identify the most significant events that contributed to the current form of these disciplines. The work not only shows which events occurred, and thus answers to the question "what", but also looks for the causes of these events and answers the question "why". Developmental line is examined primarily in the area of UK.

No description available.

published_or_final_version / Environmental Management / Master / Master of Science in Environmental Management

A prototype computer based expert system has been developed to aid energy managers by speeding the energy auditing process and rapidly identifying potential low cost and fast pay-back energy saving investments for a wide range of businesses. It consists of a generally applicable energy management system based on sound, tried theory and practical experience gained from a number of energy management surveys. These surveys were used to identify key data requirements for the identification of common areas of wastage. The system uses sparse data analysis and the building energy signature model. It produces an entire energy audit and list of economic recommendations for a site based upon minimal input data. This is accomplished by reference to a number of internal databases containing the technical information required, as well as the entire set of algorithms and mathematical routines required for the analyses. The prototype was tested with a synthetic data set derived from the site surveys and with real data from a large tertiary college and it was found to give credible results in line with those produced by extensive and in-depth manual data-gathering and analysis.

This study estimates the effect that the auditor's assessment of his business risk has on his acquisition of evidence and his pricing of audit services. Auditor's business risk (ABR) is defined as the uncertainty in the auditor's cash flows that arises because there is some probability of the auditor incurring a loss from litigation, adverse publicity or other events arising in connection with his examination of the client's financial statements. The portion of ABR that evidence can reduce is referred to as evidence-sensitive ABR. The portion of ABR that cannot be reduced with evidence is referred to as insurance ABR. The auditor is expected to respond to evidence-sensitive ABR by acquiring costly evidence and to insurance ABR by including a risk premium in his fee offer. Both the amount of evidence and the risk premium are expected to affect the auditor's offer. Audit effort is used to measure evidence and the price per unit of effort is used to measure the risk premium. Audit effort is hypothesized to be positively correlated with evidence-sensitive ABR. The price per unit of effort is hypothesized to be positively correlated with insurance ABR. The regression results support both hypotheses. All four variables selected to represent evidence-sensitive ABR have positive coefficients as predicted. Three of the evidence-sensitive ABR variables are significant at the 0.01 level and the fourth is significant at the 0.06 level. Four of the five variables selected to capture insurance ABR have positive coefficients as predicted. The levels of significance for these coefficients range from 0.01 to 0.13. An unexpected result is that the fifth variable, relating to a client as a going concern, has a negative and significant coefficient.

No description available.

M.Com. (Computer Auditing) / Modern organizations are increasingly dependent on information technology (IT) for various reasons: to enhance their operational efficiency, reduce costs or even attain a competitive advantage. The role of information technology in the organization continues to evolve and this has an impact for the internal audit functions that serve these organizations. The study investigated whether the King III report, ISACA standards and IIA standards assist the internal audit function in addressing the impact of information technology on the organization and, as a result, the internal audit function itself. This was performed by way of a comprehensive literature study on the internal audit function and the selected standards and corporate governance framework, the role of information technology in both the organization and the internal audit function, as well as an empirical study detailing a comparative analysis of the King III report, ISACA standards and IIA standards, utilizing key success factors. The study identified an alignment of the key principles and elements identified in the King III report, ISACA standards and IIA standards. There was direct support for ITrelated reviews in the King III report, ISACA Standards and IIA Standards. The comparative analysis performed between the King III report and IIA standards, as well as the ISACA standards and the IIA standards resulted in the formulation of key internal audit success factors. These key success factors compared favourably to those identified in the literature review. The study indicated that the King III report, ISACA Standards and IIA Standards assisted the internal audit function by addressing IT related risks, controls and governance elements.

The objective of this study is to identify the factors that lead UK non-financial listed companies to voluntary use an IAF. In addition, this study aims to investigate the IAF effectiveness in these companies, the factors affecting this, and the relative importance of these factors. Using the Agency and the Transactions Cost Economics (TCE) theories, the study collected financial and non-financial data from the annual reports and the DataStream for 332 UK non-financial companies listed in the London Stock Exchange main market in 2009. In addition, postal questionnaires were sent to the head of internal audit and the audit committee chairman in 213 companies which have an internal audit department. The study provides evidence that firm size, level of risks, agency problem between owners and managers, and the existence of an effective audit committee are important drivers for the voluntary use of IAF. In addition, it provides strong evidence that firm’s characteristics affect the IAF quality characteristics. Large companies with an effective audit committee are more likely to have high quality IAFs. Furthermore, the questionnaire’s findings provide evidence that IAFs provide different types of both assurance and consulting activities to their companies, and that the majority of respondents are satisfied that the IAF is effective and has a positive impact on internal control, risk management, and governance processes. However, the results indicate that the IAF characteristics significantly affect its scope of services and its perceived effectiveness. Consistent with this, respondents acknowledge that having a strong relationship with the audit committee, adopting risk based internal audit, and having IAF staff with various backgrounds are the most important factors for IAF effectiveness. Collectively, the results of this study suggest the importance of having an IAF to corporate governance and the importance of redesigning it in a way that enhance its effectiveness.

The purpose of this study was to try to identify the impact of ambiguity and risk on the auditor's judgment about inherent risk and control risk when planning the audit. A second purpose was to determine how ambiguity tolerance/intolerance affects judgment.

Quality system auditing has been a topic of much recent discussion but there has not been a commensurate amount of research on how the audit process can make more effective use of auditor time and improve the quality of their judgements. An approach certification bodies and their clients may adopt is to measure the quality system activities of the client, and use these measurements (or metrics) to improve their understand of the quality system. If these metrics were available to auditors, they could identify the strengths and weaknesses of the quality system and assist in deciding if the client complies with ISO 9000. This could make the audit process more cost-effective and focused. A detailed study of the current auditing process used by certification bodies, and a survey of auditors, identified the quality system activities that provide the most confidence that the company has a compliant quality system. The "quality loop" activities of internal audit/management review and corrective action were found to be both the most important activities in showing compliance and provide the basis of metrics that can inform the auditor about the state of health of these activities. Metrics capable of measuring the other quality system activities required by ISO 9000 are identified, and their effectiveness in monitoring the quality system is discussed. The research shows that metrics concerned with the quality loop can provide useful information to an auditor and can help them in reaching a judgement. It is also shown that the use of metrics is constrained by organisational and technical factors, such as the size of the organisation being measured and the correspondence between the activity being measured and the requirements of ISO 9000.