ANSWERING AUDIT RISK QUESTIONS (Part 2)

ACCA F8 考試：ANSWERING AUDIT RISK QUESTIONS (Part 2)

In addition, a risk can relate to a practical problem the audit team may face, such as attendance at inventory counts where the company has multiple sites holding simultaneous inventory counts, or if the company has had significant changes in their finance department and so the risk of fraud and error has increased.

The common mistake is for candidates to identify a relevant issue from the scenario and then consider the risk to the company rather than to the auditor, linking into the related assertion.

Therefore, using Question 3b from the June 2011 exam: ‘The travel agents are given a 90-day credit period to pay Donald Co; however, due to difficult trading conditions, a number of the receivables are struggling to pay.’ The audit risk related to this point is that if receivables are struggling to pay, then they may be overstated and, hence, valuation of receivables is the relevant risk.

The business faces the risk of slow cash flows and so there is a business risk related to the liquidity of Donald Co. While going concern is an audit risk, the above point from the scenario is not sufficient on its own to indicate going concern risk.

In addition, Question 1a from the June 2010 exam told candidates: ‘Purchase orders for overseas paint are made six months in advance and goods can be in transit for up to two months.’ The explanation of the audit risk would be to ascertain that the cut-off of inventory is appropriate at the year end. However, many candidates explained that the company may encounter problems with stock-outs of goods, which is focused more on operational business risk rather than on the risks to the financial statements.

Other examples of audit risks include:

• treatment of capital and revenue expenditure – the risk here could relate to existence of property plant and equipment if revenue expenditure has been capitalised rather than charged as an expense in the income statement

• valuation of inventory – when, for example, there are considerable levels of aged inventory

• completeness of liabilities – this could arise if provisions have been incorrectly treated as contingent liabilities

• completeness of revenue – this could be relevant where the entity being audited has significant cash sales.