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How auditing should reflect the pandemic
Audit files need to reflect the challenges and uncertainties of the pandemic. Peter Herbert suggests key areas of focus, including impairment, materiality, letters of support, COVID-19 support schemes, information produced by the entity and professional scepticism.
Audit firms have been battling with the consequences of the pandemic for some time and it continues to pose significant challenges. Among these is the autopsy phase, when audit quality from the pandemic is put under the spotlight during internal and external file review processes.
Increasingly, pandemic-impacted audit files are being subjected to cold file reviews, and documentation is a key area of focus. It always has been. This is evidenced by the findings included in ICAEW’s Audit Monitoring Report 2020 and earlier monitoring reports.