ACCAF8考試：Audit risk

審計風險和企業風險

For the purposes of the Paper F8 exam, it is important to make a distinction between audit risk and business risk (which is not examinable in Paper F8), even though ISA 315 itself does not make such a distinction clear. ISA 315(2) defines business risk as follows:

‘A risk resulting from significant conditions, events, circumstances, actions or inactions that could adversely affect an entity’s ability to achieve its objectives and execute its strategies, or from the setting of inappropriate objectives and strategies.’

Hence, business risk is a much broader concept than audit risk. Students are reminded that business risk is excluded from the Paper FAU and Paper F8 syllabus, although it is examinable in Paper P7.

審計風險模型

Finally, it is important to make reference to the so called traditional audit risk model, which pre-dates ISA 315, but continues to remain important to the audit process. The audit risk model breaks audit risk down into the following three components:

固有風險1Inherent risk

This is the susceptibility of an assertion about a class of transaction, account balance, or disclosure to a misstatement that could be material, either individually or when aggregated with other misstatements, before consideration of any related controls.

可控風險Control risk

This is the risk that a misstatement could occur in an assertion about a class of transaction, account balance or disclosure, and that the misstatement could be material, either individually or when aggregated with other misstatements, and will not be prevented or detected and corrected, on a timely basis, by the entity’s internal control.

檢查風險Detection risk

This is the risk that the procedures performed by the auditor to reduce audit risk to an acceptably low level will not detect a misstatement that exists and that could be material, either individually or when aggregated with other misstatements.

The interrelationship of the three components of audit risk is outside the scope of this current article. Paper F8 students, however, will typically be expected to have a good understanding of the concept of audit risk, and to be able to apply this understanding to questions in order to identify and describe appropriate risk assessment procedures.

THE UK AND IRELAND PERSPECTIVE

The UK Auditing Practices Board announced in March 2009 that it would update its auditing standards according to the clarified ISAs, and that these standards would apply for audits of accounting periods ending on or after 15 December 2010. UK and Irish students should note that there are no significant differences on audit risk between ISA 315 and the UK and Ireland version of the standard.

總結

The concept of audit risk is of key importance to the audit process and Paper F8 students are required to have a good understanding of what audit risk is, and why it is so important. For the purposes of the Paper F8 exam, it is important to understand that audit risk is a very practical topic and is therefore examined in a very practical context. Any definition or explanation of the audit risk model itself will usually only be allocated a small number of marks, but many students still include such definitions in answers to case study and scenario questions which require a practical application of audit risk assessment procedures. Students must also be prepared to apply their understanding of audit risk to questions and come up with appropriate risk assessment procedures.

Written by a member of the Paper F8 examining team

References

1.IAASB Handbook 2009, Glossary of Terms.

2.ISA 315, Identifying and Assessing the Risks of Material Misstatement Through Understanding the Entity and Its Environment, paragraph 4 (b).

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