VideoDavid McCann, CFO.com | US
June 1, 2009
- Internal Audit 24/7
While going through the vaild comments from the learned professionals, it is sure that 100% auditing is a costly affairs.
Where is a good system in force, fully supported by a current & updated approved Policy and Procedures, rotation of employees in key areas are applied, computer system logging all transactions on real time basis as audit trial, then applying the Audit Vault ( oracle Audit vault or SAP R/3 audit vault), a smart Internal Auditor with experience can easily find out the deviations to the existing Policy and Procedures and report on them.
Using ACL or equivalent software effciently to find out the deviations from large population is must. Professionals with CIA qualitification is must for major companies for conducting Internal Auditing. Outsourcing from audit firms, with out CIA qualified staff conducting internal audit does not add much value. Therefore, practising Internal Auditors should be encouraged and they are covered by the code of ethics foumulated by ICIA, USA. Their reports should be reviwed by External Auditors and they should incorporate any adverse comments of the Internal Auditors on major issues in the External Auditors report. The profession of IA should be recognised at par with Audit Firms and not a mere consultant. Also if the audit firm does not have qualified and experienced CIA, they should not be encouraged for outsourcing the internal audit services provided sufficient firms practicing IA are not available.
K.Kalyana Raman
M.Com..F.C.A.,AICWAI, ACMA., CIA
www.ccsbahrain.comPosted by KRISHNAMOORTHY KALYANARAMAN | Jul 29, 2009 11:50 AM ET
- PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE OF CIA's
Dear CIA's and MIIA's fraternity,
Institutions and governments should learn that, The CIA and MIIA are equally as strong a profession LIKE OTHER accountancy qualification. OUR QUARREL is with top management and governments, with Boards or Parliaments THAT regulate and enact laws, that would enforce internal audit services. I have been singing this song since 1992,it only lands on deaf ears.
Now, fraud and corrupton is on the forefront of every government , business institituons and news papers.Every body is talking about waging wars to fight this scourge called fraud and corruption. The most alarming issues here are, the way institutions are left to the CEOS to manage without proper checks and balances except from/by the statutory audit reports.
Allow me to therefore, suggest that governments and professional bodies should in their foras to REVIEW laws that will enforce the internal audit services to be practiced effctively and efficiently.We suggest that,the UN ,EC, AFRICA UNION, ASIA, and many other world bodies should ENAHNCE this idea to change the world practices. fraud and corruption wil be fought in society.
Internal Auditing practice, is as old as man kind. laws have been enacted following religious books,except internal audit laws are not.
INTERNAL AUDITORS ARE SAYING, WE ARE MARGINALISED AND WE NEED A HEARING. WE, WANT TO PRACTICE INTERNAL AUDITING WITH FULL KNOWELDGE OF STAKEHOLDERS, THAT WE MUST DO OUR WORK and WE DO OUR WORK WITH ALL THE ABBILTIES AT HAND. Leaving us to report only to the Audit committes, is not enough, we should report to national parliaments AND this should be a requirement by Law.OR ECONOMIC POLICY BODIES LIKE SEC OR IFS, to help monitor the internal audit events and also to monitor the insitutional practices.
CIA's,MIIA's should be allowed to open up internal audit firms like we see the statutory audit firms. CPA firms have been all along rendering this wonderful internal audit service. As well, we should have high stakes in Audit firms that continue to render outsourced internal audit services, when the CIA'S OR MIIA's cant be allowed to practice internal auditing services except as consultants. I feel this should not be the way forward for us. Our profession is a profession in its own right, the world over. We should not keep mum as other professions will discrate us.
Lets make our voices heard. We are not responsible for the credit crunch, it the world economic order to blame. Internal auditors will offer relentless services to the business and governments.Internal Auditing is our profession and it is the reason we are here to deliver. Put hold on insttutions that do not honour internal auditing. let institutions employ internal audutors who are qualified or are about to qualify in internal auditing profession. we are more than bookkeeping service providers because we are of the higher level .
I sound like drumming for support, yes we can provice good services to governments and business entities. We do perform operational auditing or comprehensive auditing, public sector auditing,value for money auditing, risk auditing,environmental auditing,contract auditing,construction auditing, procurement auditing, behaviral auditing, human resource auditing, systems auditing,strategic auditing, management auditing, marketing audit,insitutional audit,name it but a few. So what we are saying that internal auditing is not a complementary pracitice to accounting, it is a fully fledged accountancy professional internal audit practice and ,in its own right. Therefore ,institutions the world over including those countries highlighted by Transparency International corruption index 2009, as the most corrupt countries should be target number one, by well wishers to vehemently advice them to change their practices or should never condone fraud and corrupton with ZERO tolalence as the most effect weapon to direct, to these fraud and corrpution governments and hooligans.Posted by RICHARD BERNARD GUDOI GID'AGUI | Jun 6, 2009 10:26 AM ET
- Continuous Auditing
My colleague Dr. Lydia Schliefer and myself wrote an article more than 12 years ago calling for this process to occurr and glad to see it finally happening.
Glover, H., L. Schliefer. ?Continuous Auditing: An Idea Whose Time Has Come? Small Business Controller (Vol. 1, No., 1 1997)
Dr. Hubert D. Glover, CMA, CIA, CPA/CITPPosted by Hubert Glover | Jun 2, 2009 3:26 PM ET
- Real Time Audit
Correction after the fact is always more expensive than prevention.I think the IA profession is heading towards real time audits.
Posted by Wael Bibi | Jun 2, 2009 2:26 PM ET
- Cumbersome? Here's to Prevention AND Detection
Cumbersome? I'm puzzled about why the Executive Director of the British Columbia Ministry of Finance, Office of Comptroller General would describe as "cumbersome" the pre-payment issuance process of, for one, determining if goods had actually been received by proper authority prior to issuance of payment for their purchase. To where were the goods delivered? Who received them? Were they diverted to an employee's home or to another unintended recipient? Who has CUSTODY of the asset purchased by the organization? As an auditor, I would have significant concern with such a system as is described in the article. Such a system, as described, is, in my opinion, "ripe for fraud". From the description of that system, I see no regard to the concept of "Prevention" which is the process of lowering the risk of fraud before it happens. Their consultant recommended auditing a sample of payments "post-transaction". That is "Detection", which comes after the fact. If fraud happened, and the post-transactions (Detection) sampling process caught it, well, it was caught. However, the money is gone. What expense would then have to be incurred to get the money back? If someone from the Ministry of Finance would like to respond to my comment by writing a comment to this article describing how the concept of Prevention is addressed in their system, I'd welcome such a response.
Posted by Desmond Powers | Jun 2, 2009 11:58 AM ET
- Systems Audit
System Audit and built in-controls are always good easy to monitor and important for control. Need a striking balance btw the ?what controls we have vs. what we need? in dynamic business environment.
Posted by krishna munagala | Jun 2, 2009 10:22 AM ET
- Automation is good, but it can give a false sense of security
My world of internal auditing is a bit different than the accounting realm, however both are very similar, and very closely related.
My firm focuses specifically on software license compliance and technology auditing.
With technology, and specifically software inventories, there are a host of tools that can be used to automate and scan networks for inventory counts and related asset listings.
What I have personally seen over the years is a growing dependency on "networks scans" and automation... exclusively. What I mean by that is, some managers let automated numbers dictate policy, with very little oversight and review.
As I do believe that automation is paramount in today's commercial world (our systems and protocols are simply to big to do things "the old fashioned way."), nothing can replace the human-element when it relates to ANY type of auditing.
Computers are fast. But they don't form opinions. They can't construct strategic operational plans. And they can't interpret contacts.
My firm has seen many, many companies expose themselves to tremendous liability by relying strictly on data compilations from automated system protocols, exclusively. Sadien's strategy is to help clients use technology to "harvest" the data, and allow human beings interpret it. (A rudimentary concept I know... but a conceptual practice that seems to be fading with time.)
Again, our arena of internal auditing is a bit different, but closely related, nonetheless.
G.C. Hutson
Chief Executive and Partner
Sadien Intellectual Property, Inc.
www.sadien.comPosted by G.C. Hutson | Jun 2, 2009 8:35 AM ET
