The Center for Audit Quality has issued a report on a recent meeting of the Treasury Department's Advisory Committee on the Auditing Profession.
The meeting, held April 1, was led by committee co-chairs Arthur Levitt Jr., and Donald T. Nicolaisen.
The Subcommittee on Human Capital discussed the establishment of a professional school of accounting, as well as quality-of-life issues for auditors, particularly related to five- and seven-year partner rotation rules.
The Subcommittee on Firm Structure and Finances urged the creation of an international center for auditing firms to share fraud prevention and detection techniques, experiences and best practices. The same subcommittee discussed the feasibility of appointing independent members with full voting power to firm or advisory boards to improve transparency and governance at firms.
The committee was asked to reconsider the 2010 deadline for adoption of mobility provisions of the Uniform Accountancy Act, suggesting that moving it to 2011 would avoid the risk of setting a deadline that may be impossible to achieve.
The Subcommittee on Concentration and Competition discussed audit quality metrics for firms and recommended that the PCAOB develop a battery of key indicators of audit quality that could be the subject of disclosure by audit firms. Committee members also debated a recommendation for establishing key performance indicators for audit quality by firms.
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