Audit Function in United Arab Emirates
Auditing is an area that has evolved a lot and of recent it has become indispensible. This is because there is a completely new dimension presented by this practice. Initially, auditing used to concentrate mostly on corporate compliance plus institution of strong financial controls. However, the modern businesses in United Arab Emirates do not have much worry with financial controls or compliance but rather are concerned with risk assessment and mitigation. For any listed company, auditing play a key role in risk assessment aspect. It mainly acts as the watchdog to the shareholders of the company and gives assessment to impending risks.
Businesses in United Arab Emirates operate at very advanced level. However, United Arab Emirates (UAE) lacks her own accounting standards. You find that most of the principles used in accounting and auditing results from the firms that carry out this practice in this country. It is therefore the mandate of these accounting/auditing firms to employ International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in their operations to attain credibility. With most corporations being owned by both residents and non residents of UAE, application of the IFRS becomes very practical to everyone. The diversity in ownership of businesses in UAE gives every reason as to why audit is a fundamental tool that is being made use of in this country. The benefits accrued to this aspect are incredible and this paper endeavors to explore the auditing functions pegged in this culturally diverse business environment based in Dubai.
Something you need to keep in mind all through is that in UAE, though the company law gives outlines of preparing audited financial reports, there is no obligator...
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...on unearths the risks facing the organization and brings to light the true state of the control and governance processes in the organization as well as proposing the changes to be effected. Therefore, in United Arab Emirates, auditors operate in two distinct capacities. Firstly, irrespective of whether the auditor is internal or external, he carries out a thorough, independent and objective examination of the activities of the organization ranging from financial to the ethical practices disclosing their appropriateness. Secondly, the auditor is regarded as an agent of the much awaited change because he not only reports his findings from his audit but also advises on how the situation can be improved to better the current situation. However, despite all these evolvements on the functions of auditors in UAE, compliance remains auditor’s primary role in any enterprise.
When it comes to the audit objectives, the public and the auditing profession maintain varying expectations. The public expects the prevention of fraud to be the auditor’s responsibility. However, the auditors believe that they are responsible for fraud detection, but not obliged to find all of it. In addition, the public views the fraud by the characteristics displayed by management and employees. For example, WoolEx Mills’ management wanted to exude a prevailing financial position and to uphold reputations. By committing financial statement fraud, it made the company look successful even though Sales and cash flows were decreasing. The public would view these particular characteristics as pressures to why the company committed fraud. Greed, recognition, and influences also impacted the public’s view of Wool Ex Mills’ fraud scheme. The CEO used authority to influence employees to take part in the fraud scheme. The public would see that the CEO utilized power to manipulate shareholders, which impacted their trust with WoolEx Mills (Cohen, Ding, Lesage, & Stolowy 2015) (Krishnan & Shah
With every business activity come opportunities for fraudulent behavior which leads to a greater demand for auditors with unscathed ethics. Nowadays, auditors are faced with a multitude of ethical issues, and it is even more problematic when the auditors fail to adhere to the standards of professional conducts as prescribed by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). The objective of this paper is to analyze the auditors’ compliance with the code of professional conduct in the way it relates to the effectiveness of their audits.
The oversight responsibilities of the board, the CAE lacking of expertise or broad understanding of financial controls and responsibilities, and the understaffed internal audit functions lacking of independence and direct access to the board of directors contributed to the absence of internal controls. To begin with, the board should be retrained to achieve financial literacy to review financial reporting. Other than attending formal meetings, the board of directors should be more involved with the management. For the Audit Committee, the two members who were recruited as acquaintances to Brennahan need be replaced with experts who are more sufficiently knowledgeable about accounting rules beyond merely “financially literate”. Furthermore, the internal audit functions need to expand with different expertise commensurate with the expanded activities of the organization, testing financial reporting rather than internal controls from an operational perspective. The CAE should be more independent and proactive to execute audit plans, instead of following orders from the CFO, and initiate a direct and efficient communication between internal audit and audit
We have been engaged to audit the financial statements for Exxon Mobil Corporation (ExxonMobil) and assess the effectiveness of their internal controls for the fiscal year ended December 31st, 2010 in compliance with the laws of the state of Texas and the standards set forth by the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB). In the previous memo sent, we outlined the client’s high inherent risk due to the account balances and transactions, foreign currency translations and the complexity of accounting for and auditing the client’s vast oil reserves and inventories. This memo will address preliminary assessment of control risk and the appropriate level of detection risk given the forgoing conclusions on inherent risk, audit risk and control risk.
Accounting systems in Saudi Arabia was shown to be imported from developed countries. Although in Saudi Arabia, the accounting principle and structures were primarily constructed from Western countries, the new accounting system has been reformed to adapt the unique Saudi Arabian environment. The various factors might explain how the new accounting system emerges. This paper will analyze how the three main factors-economy environment, taxation policies and foreign accounting standards and principles affect accounting systems in Saudi Arabia.
I have applied the IFRS to audit half-year income statement and statement of finical position from domestic sub-company or oversea branches. This allows me to understand the difficultly of dealing with accounting report form different nations. For example, we have to negotiate each report from the U.S. with their reporter by phone. It would take incredibly long time to explain the difference in order to adjust the figures in the reports. During the stuff training, we have been taught that to be professional at everywhere and anytime. Moreover, I realise that the most important feature to be a professional accountancy is responsibility. This is because that a unit of misallocation will cost other team number a huge amount of work to correct it. The experience of taking notes of weekly conferences between senior managers and PWC partner has indicates that how does change in financial policy influence the accounting treatment. For instant, since vice-perminster Mr Le Ke Qiang who visited China Construction Bank at earlier May. He point out that the Rate of Non-Performing Loans could not exceed 7% in the “BIG Four” Chinese bank. This has led Chinese bank to relax its accounting standard of credit rating. It allows me to understand the relationship between government and financial
In general financial statements represent a formal record of an entity’s performance over a certain period of time which contains useful information to shareholders to assist them in making decisions (IFRS, 2014). In recent years, a wide range of users including shareholders and investors are interested in financial statements such as competitors, lenders and so on. Hence the audit report is prepared to provide an independent examination and the expression of opinion on financial statements (Millichamp and Taylor, 2012). However whether the information that auditors faithfully present or the users can totally rely on might still be the big question. Nonetheless under rules and regulations set by accounting boards, audit reports show the external opinion on true and fair view of the company’s financial statements and reduce the “Audit Expectation Gap” (AEG).
Audit is a process to evaluate and review the accounts and financial statement objectively. We can divide it into internal auditors and external auditors. Internal auditors have a inner knowledge of business process. Auditor has access to the much confidential information and all levels of management. But they may lose their judgement and they are not acceptable by the shareholder. “The overall objective of the external auditors is to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements as a whole are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error, and to report on the financial statements in acco...
According to the IMF’s 2008 UAE ML and FT report (2008), the UAE lacks a precise duty on the part of financial institutions, to identify the primary and beneficial ownership as well as the control of the majority of companies with whom they have business de...
The globalization of business has resulted in the need for compatible accounting standards that can be used internationally for financial reporting. As a result, the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) were developed by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) to unify the various financial reporting methods and create a single accounting standard which can be applied to any financial statement worldwide (Byatt). The global standardization of financial reporting will increase the readability and enhance comparability of globally traded companies’ financial statements, without the need of conversion or translation. There are a few main differences between the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and the U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (U.S GAAP). The increasing recognition and acceptance of the International Financial Reporting Standards by accounting professionals in the United States, will affect the way in which the U.S will record financial statements in the future.
...e financial reports and statements are correct. This auditing will be conducted by auditing department of the organization, even may be done by an independent auditor who is not part of the organization, and sometimes public officials are elected. In case of unmatched consequences the organization need to give explanation on the misrepresentation of wrong statements. Auditors purpose is then to ensure that the misrepresentations are corrected, then maintain accurate, reliable financial documents and statements.
The audit risk is consists of three elements which are inherent risk, control risk and detection risk. The audit model is important to the audit process. The audit risk model provides the basic for the current emphasis on the risk-based audit approach and it assists the auditor in determining the scope of auditing procedures for a particular account balance or class of transactions. Based on the assessed risk, the auditor may determine whether the use of more tests of control or substantive procedures is appropriate to address the
Overall, the company is having ineffective controls regarding different departments and in the whole organization. An effective internal audit department should be established within the organization which should test the effectiveness of these controls on regular basis and make it sure that all controls are working effectively and efficiently with the different departments of the organization. Also the Internal auditor should implement the most effective processes and measures to prevent and detect the fraud, corruption and non compliance with the laws and regulations in the organization. Establishment of internal audit committee would be helpful in this regard which comprises of executive and non executive directors.
The fundamental duty of an external financial auditor is to form and express an opinion on whether the reporting entity’s financial statements are prepared in accordance with the relevant financial reporting framework. In discharging this duty, the auditor must exercise “reasonable skill, care and caution” (Lopes, J. in Kingston Cotton Mill Co 1896) as reflected in current legal and professional requirements.
The evolution of auditing is a complicated history that has always been changing through historical events. Auditing always changed to meet the needs of the business environment of that day. Auditing has been around since the beginning of human civilization, focusing mainly, at first, on finding efraud. As the United States grew, the business world grew, and auditing began to play more important roles. In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, people began to invest money into large corporations. The Stock Market crash of 1929 and various scandals made auditors realize that their roles in society were very important. Scandals and stock market crashes made auditors aware of deficiencies in auditing, and the auditing community was always quick to fix those deficiencies. The auditors’ job became more difficult as the accounting principles changed, and became easier with the use of internal controls. These controls introduced the need for testing; not an in-depth detailed audit. Auditing jobs would have to change to meet the changing business world. The invention of computers impacted the auditors’ world by making their job at times easier and at times making their job more difficult. Finally, the auditors’ job of certifying and testing companies’ financial statements is the backbone of the business world.