The International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB) has issued a consultation on a brand new International Standard on Sustainability Assurance (ISSA) 5000
The Prudential Regulation Authority has fined Credit Suisse a record £87m for significant failures in risk management and governance related to Archegos
The government is going ahead with plans to improve audit transparency in response to major corporate collapses like outsourcer Carillion which shook business confidence in the role of audit
Auditor BDO has signed off WANDisco’s accounts after months of delay as the listed IT data specialists reported a ‘significant, sophisticated’ fraud with millions of pounds of sales wrongly booked
The accountancy profession is struggling to hire experienced auditors and new talent, as salary pressures and excessive workloads are felt across the board
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has been criticised in a report by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) for its inability to account for £3.3bn worth of test and trace inventory
All the Grant Thornton audits inspected in this year’s AQI were judged to require no more than limited improvements, but the mid-tier firm will be relegated to Tier 2 in the audit inspection process as its share of listed audit business has dropped
Nearly half of Mazars audits inspected in the current AQI round required improvements while efforts to turn around the performance of audit teams was taking longer than expected
BDO came under fire for the quality of audit work in the latest FRC inspection round with two audits requiring significant improvements over revenue and journal testing, while staffing issues also were a factor
EY made overall improvements in the quality of its audit work this year, but revenue recognition and management challenges still need to be tackled as well as workload
KPMG was the only Big Four firm to be flagged over an audit requiring significant improvement with three quarters of audits meeting the quality standard set by FRC inspectors
Only three inspected audits required limited improvements as PwC continued to invest in audit quality and addressed issues around revenue recognition, but potential conflicts of interest were flagged
Deloitte improved the quality of audit work across the board with no audits requiring significant improvements although there were some issues related to revenue recognition in the annual audit quality inspection (AQI) cycle
A quarter of audits of listed companies are still failing to meet standards set by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) with criticism of audit of revenue recognition and a failure to challenge management