The Connected Accountant

New Ethics Rules

With the ink barely dry on the last iteration, here come IFAC with some revised independence guidelines - effective 1/1/11.

The full rules are a bit of a grind at 132 pages, but there are some interesting highlights:

The revised codeextends the independence requirements for audits of listed entities to all "public-interest entities."  You will hit page 126 before the definition of a "public interest entity" becomes clear.  In addition to the obvious - quoted companies, the standard will also apply to any entity required to have a similar audit. So, private companies, government departments, charities, etc. might all now be covered by this extension.

The revised code also now precludes audit partners from being evaluated on (or compensated for) selling non-assurance services to their audit clients.

The material that addresses the definition of a network and a network firm for independence purposes appears untouched at this stage.

National institutes (AICPA, CICA, et al) will now have to go through their own consultation and notification process in order to get these revised rules adopted.

Accountants have no sense of humor?

Apparently, it's true.

The best April Fools joke that was (attempted to be) perpetrated on or by accountants in the media realm appears to have been in Accountancy Age from the UK.  Among the obvious clues that this was bogus was the line:

‘There is a really challenging scene where one auditor sharpens a pencil for almost eight minutes. It’s electric. Almost as good as Omar Sharif’s entry on a camel in Lawrence of Arabia.'

The premise is that Jason Statham (Transporter, Italian Job) plays an audit partner in a drug and drink fueled romp through the high stress world of attestation.

Nobody enjoys good satire more than me - but this was useless.  If this is the best that accountants can do at mocking themsleves then it is a doomed profession!

I hope that somebody out there has better examples.