In 2001, the Federal Law No. 119 was adopted, which finally determined the position of auditors and audited entities, their duties, rights. The law established the position of the auditors themselves, organizations involved in auditing. In addition, the PSAD, which passed the approval of the Presidential Audit Commission, was devoted to this issue. Thanks to this, the responsibility of auditors and audit firms is now declared by law. Over time, many adjustments were made that allowed in our country this activity lead to international standards.
Rights are important
Based on current laws, the rights, duties and responsibilities of the auditor are directly related to the specifics of a particular situation. Therefore, the company has the right to choose methods, forms, based on its own reasoning. The exception will be those issues for which the requirements are spelled out in the PSAD. It provides guidance on specific cases on how to plan an operation, formalize it, what working documents and how to keep it, how to draw up a report.
The rights and responsibilities of the auditor include checking with the subject documents stored at the enterprise, reflecting the economic, financial activities of the organization. If some property is taken into account in them, the audit company has the right to check whether it really is.
What can an auditor do?
Under current law, the auditor may require explanations from officials on any unclear issues related to verification. If during the course of events there is a need to obtain additional information, he has the right to request them and demand the execution of the request.
Since the responsibility of the auditor and the audited entity is directly related to the quality of the audit, in some cases, the audit company may consider that the operations necessary to successfully solve the problem are not feasible. In this situation, the specialist may refuse to conduct an audit, formulate a conclusion on how reliable the documentation reflecting the financial activities of the enterprise. Current laws give him such a right.
Where rights appear, there are obligations
According to legal standards, the auditor is responsible for conducting the operations entrusted to him in accordance with the standards and rules introduced by the current legislation of our country. This means that the verification will have to be carried out taking into account all the requirements specified in the already mentioned 119th Federal Law.
The responsibility and duty of the auditor is to provide data on the rules and requirements of the applicable laws of the organization that requested the services of an audit company. The data that the specialist is required to provide must one way or another relate to verification issues. This may be the Federal Law, other regulatory acts that control how conclusions are drawn during the audit, on which the comments of auditors on the activities of a legal entity can be based.
Is there anything else?
Responsibility of auditors and audit organizations includes the transfer of opinions strictly within the contractual deadlines. In this case, the information is sent either to the person with whom the contract for cooperation was signed, or directly to the legal entity whose verification was carried out.
The professional responsibility of the auditor implies a guarantee of the safety of all official papers falling into the hands of verification specialists. In addition, the audit company is responsible for the safety of the documentation generated by the events.The contents of these securities must not be disclosed, except to the person who has concluded the agreement and / or to the person whose activity has been checked. In addition, disclosure is possible in certain cases established by law. This is officially called the “audit secret”, and the auditor’s responsibility in this matter is legally protected by strict requirements. Violation of conditions is punishable by serious punishments.
Obligations oblige
All those obligations that are prescribed in the contract when registering the cooperation of the auditor and the person in need of verification must be meticulously meticulously. Of course, it would be nice to guarantee high-quality execution by both parties of the agreement. To this end, auditor liability insurance is introduced. This allows participants to be sure that the cooperation will be mutually beneficial and effective. At the same time, it is unacceptable to include in the contract such items that would contradict laws and regulations in force in the country.
The list detailing the auditor's responsibility is complemented by 48 new standards designed to expand and modernize the 119th Federal Law. They touched on appeals to companies for the purpose of insuring the liability of auditors, especially the formation and publication of opinions, as well as documentary support for the cooperation process.
Therefore...
Liability insurance means that a statutory audit, subject to a formal arrangement, should be conducted as securely as possible, with minimized risks. It is extremely important for the customer that the company's specialists express the correct, reasonable, reliable opinion on the financial documents of the enterprise. Auditor's liability insurance will be a guarantee that neither party will deviate from its obligations.
Theoretical basis
According to the law, the responsibility of the auditor is defined as follows: these are sanctions that come into force if the auditor (audit company) incorrectly, in bad faith, incompletely fulfill the obligations undertaken in accordance with the agreement. The agreement formalizes cooperation with an economic entity. Type, form of liability declared by the laws of our country. In addition, liability can be prescribed in an agreement, which indicates the sanctions imposed on the violating party.
The responsibility of the auditor is:
- administrative
- legal civil;
- criminal.
What, how, what are we talking about?
The 15th article of the Civil Code talks about what may be the responsibility of the auditor from the civil law category. In this case, we are talking about reimbursing the injured party for losses caused by improper performance by the contractor of duties. You will have to reimburse all expenses associated with the restoration of rights violated in cooperation, for example, the costs of a lawsuit or recheck. Have to reimburse the amount of lost profits.
Additionally, the situation is deciphered by Article 25 of the Civil Code, from which it follows that, due to a violation of obligations, a party must bear certain responsibility, depending on how serious the offense was.
Laws and regulations
Administrative responsibility is regulated through the Code of Administrative Offenses and the already mentioned 119th Federal Law. Only firms that have received the appropriate licenses can work as an audit company. Here you can find cases in which the responsibility of the auditors is:
- a fine when operating in an environment where the organization has not received a license;
- a fine for the activities of a company that has a legal license, but violates the conditions provided by law.
If a company violates the 119th Federal Law, it also faces administrative liability.License cancellation is possible, because of which the company loses the right to continue to work as an audit organization. If the auditors are not concerned about maintaining the secrecy of the audit, which is why the company being audited has suffered losses, they will have to be reimbursed. The organization must warn of the termination of work so that changes to the state register are made within seven days.
Criminal: what is this responsibility?
Criminal liability may be applied to the audit company if the firm's activities fall into the categories described in article 202 of the Criminal Code, on abuse of authority. This article reviews the activities of verification professionals, notaries.
It follows from the laws that companies issue a certain amount payable. It depends on the minimum wage adopted in the region and amounts to 500-800 such amounts. An alternative is a fine corresponding to the salary and income of the convicted person for 5-8 months. You can also face imprisonment - according to the law, the term reaches 3 years. In addition, the judge may decide that in the future the convicted person will not be able to hold specific posts for some time (up to 3 years), to carry out the activities mentioned in the court decision.
And if in more detail?
It is stated above what responsibility is in the event that an established crime was provided for by Article 202 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. But if the violation is administrative, what will the auditor have to face? According to the law, a fine is prescribed in the range of 100-300 of the smallest amount of remuneration characteristic of the region. And, of course, the company is deprived of its license in court.
You will have to answer according to the law if the invited specialist deliberately drew up false papers based on the results of the event. It does not matter if it was done without checking at all, it simply does not correspond to the documentation received from the enterprise. The company (auditor) loses its license upon detection of such an offense. The person whose signature is on a deliberately false document loses the qualification certificate. It is allowed to prosecute. This is possible taking into account the norms of the laws of our country. But it is simply impossible to recognize the conclusion as false, this is established by the court, adopting the relevant decision.
Independence and dependence on money
By law, an audit company must be completely independent. Also, the auditor conducting the audit should have this quality. At the same time, one cannot speak of complete independence when a monetary relationship arises between two persons, especially in a situation where person A orders a service from person B and must pay for it, but the result does not meet expectations.
The laws of our country say that the contract for the provision of audit services should contain accurate and detailed information about how much the customer must pay the auditor, in what order to remunerate, what related services can be provided and how to pay for them. It is unacceptable that these amounts depend on the conclusions reached by the auditors. This allows you to achieve a certain level of independence and justice of the conclusion of believers.
Competence and its confirmation
For the quality of the audit, it is very important that the persons conducting it have the necessary level of qualification. The level of a specialist is confirmed by a license, for which you will have to go through certain procedures established by laws. The requirements for auditors are all indicated in the same 119 Federal Law.
An auditor can only be a person with a higher education in the field of economics, legal, having experience in the relevant field of 3 years. At the state level, a register of educational institutions at various levels is maintained, which have the right to certify auditors, train, retrain personnel by conducting advanced training courses.Passing training and successful certification are confirmed by the issuance of a certificate. This document is published in accordance with the state model. Forgery of a certificate is punishable by law.
Auditor, standards and obligations
Finally, it must be mentioned that the laws in force have maintained standards for the activities of the auditor. A specialist in this field is obliged to take them into account and conduct activities in accordance with legal standards, otherwise a license can be revoked and held liable.
Audit standards are the basis for the activities of specialists and companies in this field. A qualitative level of activity follows from them; Compliance with standards - a guarantee of the reliability of the results of the audit. Each specialist should know them in order to guarantee the success of the event. Standards are uniform requirements that apply to all audit organizations in our country. They describe the workflow, preparation for it, related services.