An auditor is a person who is in a position to conduct an audit. An Audit is defined as the ability to investigate and conduct an inspection of all the accounts, and records of an organization to ascertain there are no irregularities with the finances and spending manner of the organization with regard to its income/ finances. To be able to conduct such an investigation. An auditor has to be in a position to which they are able to understand their obligations and duties towards the organization, society and any other users of their services. This paper seeks to identify the auditor’s responsibilities and obligations and will also determine the ethical obligations of the auditors to perform professional services.
Responsibility of the Auditor
The first objective of conducting an audit for any organization is to ensure that the financial records of the organization are in order (Jeffrey, 2015). Where the financials of a company do not tally, then the operations of that company are not in order as it is unable to determine its current financial position. It is thus the responsibility of the auditor to provide a report, after examination of the records, which is fair and provides an independent opinion on the state and nature of the company’s financial statements and whether they conform to accepted financial principles.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
To be able to determine this, the auditor requires to have the knowledge pertaining to the law of the land. It is his responsibility to ensure that at all times, he is aware of the various laws which address the financial situation of different organizations. In so doing, he is able to accurately investigate areas of the organizations financial statements which are not at par with the law of the land and the various principles of financial accounting. The auditor also has to ensure that he is well versed with the necessary knowledge and experience which allows him to conduct such an operation (Jeffrey, 2015). This involves the knowledge of the state and nature of all financial statements and how they are developed. In understanding, how they are formulated, the auditor is able to analyse all areas to provide an opinion that is based on actual information identified and analysed.
Having the knowledge of how to conduct an audit is not the only responsibility. An auditor has to have the necessary qualification from the professional bodies in the auditing field governing the land. These qualifications are coupled with the necessary experience which allows and auditor to have enough knowledge pertaining to the investigation of financial statements. These qualifications also guarantee the company being audited of the authenticity of the auditor in performing his roles and duties independently and without due influence from a third party (Jeffrey, 2015).
To guarantee the success of this operation, he must provide a suitable auditing process which will be utilized. He must exercise his own judgement pertaining to the auditing procedures and the various circumstances which will be basis for his own professional opinion on the matter. He must plan and perform the activities of the audit. These activities are done to confirm that there is no misstatement of the financial records and statements (Jeffrey, 2015). His obligation only lies in identifying that there is no misstatement where it exists, he is only to provide reasonable but not absolute, assurance on the presence of such a misstatement. It is the management’s responsibility to identify where the misstatement is originating.
Always ensuring that the auditing procedures conducting address all the areas of the organizations operations requires constant learning and experience. To this, it is the auditor’s responsibility to ensure that they attend educational workshops and trainings conducted to facilitate the growth of their experience (Jeffrey, 2015). In addition, reviewing professional publications and other educational material will also aid in enhancing the technical knowledge of the auditor during such procedures.
Ethical Obligation of the Independent Auditor
The ethical responsibilities of the auditor fall in both areas, to the organization and to his team with who he is to conduct the audit. The auditor, to his team, has to ensure that he is willing to recognize the good work they are performing. They must be in a position to provide constructive criticism. In this manner, ensuring that at all time the team is improving their performance in the auditing process to guarantee an effective audit. The auditor, in this manner, must not only show his leadership qualities, but also guide and instruct on the various activities to be conducted and in what nature or form they are to be represented. He serves as the supervisor of the team (Jeffrey, 2015). This is one of the ethical responsibilities of the auditor. The auditor also has to ensure that any quarrels presented by the organization and/or his team members during the auditing process is addressed with fairness on both sides. He should not be bias but should be objective in resolving the issue presented.
The auditor is also tasked with full disclosure of the information gained during the auditing process. He is to ensure that there are no tactics being utilized in identification of details and information regarding financial statements presented. The auditor should be transparent in presenting the findings of the auditing process as one of the ethics he is holding. In this manner, they are also morally held not to disclose any of the information gathered from the auditing process (Jeffrey, 2015). They must ensure that all the information is not discussed by any of their team members with outside parties and other auditing firms while they are conducting the audit. They must also ensure that they do not make any false, or misleading statements which may end up being damaging to the reputation of the company.
In addition to this, there is a lot temptation where organizations try to bribe the auditors to purport the information gathered during the audit process and declare their findings in accordance to the will of the organization where the financial documents are fraudulent. It is thus important to ensure that an auditor is not coerced into accepting any bribery of any form from any of the organizations it is conducting an audit of. Only from this will the moral and ethical responsibility of an auditor be upheld (Jeffrey, 2015).
Reference
Jeffrey, C. (2015). Research on Professional Responsibility and Ethics in Accounting (Vol. 19). Bingley, United Kingdom: Emerald Group Publishing.
