STYLES HEALTH SPA

Styles Health SPA



Styles Health SPA

What is Organisational Audit?

Audit performs an assurance and accountability function over the use of public resources and the veracity of financial accounts. Audits are undertaken to provide information about resource management and accounting to higher authorities and the electorate to enable them to have confidence that public resources have been used properly and effectively (Havens, 1999). Today, government auditing consists of two interrelated systems of review—public audit by external agents, and internal audit by agency management. In both cases, auditors report to a responsible authority (such as a democratic legislature, governing board, or a management team).

External auditing (generally regarded as the most important) involves the official examination of the public accounts and financial transactions by designated personnel who make their findings public. The duty of external auditors is to examine government finances to ascertain their validity, accuracy, and comprehensiveness (Havens, 1999). Crucially, although these audit officials often remain government employees, they are institutionally separated from the operational spheres of executive government (and may be supplemented by private audit firms). Once the public accounts are audited, they are, thus, externally verified and certified as true and correct (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2002).

External auditors have wide powers of search and information gathering—covering ministers and officials, documents and records, contracts and purchasing arrangements, premises and facilities, and stock or other stores. Auditors have access to virtually all government documents (even cabinet papers, commercial in-confidence information as well as performance and financial information generated and held by government agencies) (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2002). They monitor and check whether public money was properly collected and recorded (legal taxation and receipts) and properly spent (legal appropriation). The auditors attest that government accounts and in-year transactions are accurate, fully recorded, and properly supported by documentation and that the final statement of accounts gives a true representation of the end-of-year government finances (“true and correct statements”). Auditors also provide opinions about whether government has adhered to the appropriate accounting standards and conventions. A key responsibility of the auditor is to uncover fraud, financial corruption, and maladministration and, if any fraud or deception has been uncovered, to make sure that it has been exposed and rectified. In many jurisdictions, these officials may also inquire into the efficient and effective use of public resources. Their assessments enter the public domain principally through reports or briefings to the legislature (and by working closely with legislative committees such as public accounts committees).

Internal audit, by contrast, concerns the monitoring of resources within public agencies by internal staff specially selected to perform this function. The importance of internal auditing has grown in recent decades, and it now usually constitutes part of the initial phase in the external auditing function. The internal audit function is now a vital aspect of modern corporate governance frameworks. Internal auditors verify internal revenues and expenses and assist external auditors with data, investigations, and reports. Although internal auditing is a management function (reporting issues to boards or senior management ...