AICPA Code of Professional Conduct:
AICPA’s Principles on Ethics
Abstract
Life is all about making decisions. Every day we are faced with situations that lead us to making decisions. At times those decisions might be wrong, sometimes right. When facing a dilemma it’s easy to make a decision, but it’s even more difficult to make a right and ethical decision. Any person can make a decision, but they won’t always make the right decision. Decision making gets tougher when it comes to making the right and ethical decision, especially when it comes to the business world because your decision will no longer affect you, but it would also affect others. Therefore, you must always be aware of your decisions making. Due to unethical decisions,
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It highlights the importance of auditors applying sensitive and ethical judgments in all their engagements. Members have the responsibility to collaborate with each other to improve the art of accounting, as well as to maintain the public’s confidence. The auditor’s responsibilities are essential to an effective audit process because through planning, auditors should to communicate with each other, be very organized and discuss what and how to do things in order to serve the public. One of the most important parts in auditing is planning, for that reason responsibility is a must.
Examples to Article I The accounting firm BDO agreed to pay $50 million for criminal wrongdoing.
Between 1997 and 2003, the firm had sold unlawful shelter products. About $6.5 billion was made in fake tax losses. Denis Field CEO of the company was blamed for tax fraud as well as other BDO partners whom pleaded guilty. The firm had recognized their responsibility for the scheme and agreed to pay the $50 million. This case is against the art of accounting and the responsibility as professionals. The firm wasn’t ethical in decision making.
Arthur Andersen LLP is one of the “Big Five’ accounting firms. The firm was accused of shredding documents and getting rid of e-mail messages that pertained to their audit of Enron. This occurred after finding out that the Securities and Exchange Commission had begun an investigation of Enron’s accounting. The firm was
I agree with you in your position because I too believe the CPA does not have to advise Ahi on its plan to earn interest on their $100,000,000 tax liability to the IRS by mailing the check from the U.S. Virgin Islands to create a float. Article seven, scope and nature of services, of the AICPA Code of Professional Conduct sates that the CPA should observe the principles of the Code in determining the scope and nature of services provided (Colson, 2004). Ahi employee’s plan is not part of the CPA competencies in regards to taxation; the activity does not seem to be consistent with the CPA’s role. This plan should have probably been discussed within the finance or accounting department in Ahi Corporation.
Between the years 2000 and 2002 there were over a dozen corporate scandals involving unethical corporate governance practices. The allegations ranged from faulty revenue reporting and falsifying financial records, to the shredding and destruction of financial documents (Patsuris, 2002). Most notably, are the cases involving Enron and Arthur Andersen. The allegations of the Enron scandal went public in October 2001. They included, hiding debt and boosting profits to the tune of more than one billion dollars. They were also accused of bribing foreign governments to win contacts and manipulating both the California and Texas power markets (Patsuris, 2002). Following these allegations, Arthur Andersen was investigated for, allegedly,
I consider the Code of Conduct to be used as a platform of rules, or values, for CPAs while engaged in all types of assurance, non-assurance services, and should apply to all auditing functions in any given business environment, including government and non-for-profit companies. Furthermore, I feel the three key elements of the code that all CPAs should adhere to are the Integrity and Objectivity Rule, General Standards, and Acts Discreditable Rule. As a final point, could these codes of conducts also correlate to any Ignatian element of Spirituality?
Determine at least two (2) AICPA Professional Conduct principles that are most likely to be violated
In the old NMC (2008) Code; Standards of conduct, performance, and ethics for nurses and midwives, stated it 'must not discriminate in any way against those in your care.' Holland and Hogg (2010) argue that nursing is to have a consideration of the cultural knowledge, to which they highlight nursing in Australia which has embedded a notion of multiculturalism. The Australian Code of Professional Conduct (2008) states that 'Nurses respect the dignity, culture, ethnicity, values and beliefs of people receiving care and treatment.' The revised NMC (2015) Code; Professional standards of practice and behaviour for nurses and midwives, state nurses should ' avoid making assumptions and recognise diversity and individual choice.' Making nurses aware
Members of the AICPA must practice as an independent, meaning that they should be an independent when forming any form of professional work. As a professional you shouldn’t have any other ties to the company you are doing the independent work for. Within these Independence Rules the professional should follow the conceptual frame work for independence and the ethics guidelines for conflicts. When being a professional within the AICPA you need to set safeguards and protect yourself from the companies’ conflicts or problems. You need to protect yourself by follow the conceptual frame work and being sure you use ethics conflicts as a guide to take care
This section is reserved for future literature regarding the rules a member should follow in regards to responsibilities they have to their co-workers and colleagues. The AICPA Professional Code of Conduct generally states that members have a duty to remain ethical and uphold integrity in practice and relationships. This would cover the professional behavior expected with colleagues. Stay tuned for official rules to be added and defined by the AICPA.
Management constitute amongst major components of a company, organization or a business. As such, management oversees employees interactions with their supervisors and also control of people within a particular organization. Also, it includes critical and ethical decision-making process so as to address various ethical dilemmas experienced by employees while undertaking their respective assigned duties within the company. Ethical dilemmas are hereby to stay as issues usually arise now and then and place a variety of options that bear different repercussions. Therefore, it calls for ethical and critical decision-making skills so as to make the most appropriate option that bears more benefits in comparison to other options presented. While making ethical decisions, it 's substantially important to play heed to a certain ethical decision-making theory. This would enable an individual making the decision to ripe best possible consequences rather than living to regret. Moreover, ethical decision making is typically important in business as making a wrong decision may result not only in huge losses but also poor relationship amongst colleagues and miserable life for employee(s) working in a particular company or business in question.
Because Arthur Andersen was trusted and widely lauded as a great accounting firm, it had many clients and a significant profit margin. When it was discovered that the firm had "adjusted" documents for Enron, Arthur Andersen was forced to surrender its CPA licensing (Sachdev, 2003). It was heavily fined, but the damage to its reputation was the worst issue it faced. Once a
Arthur Andersen charged the client a huge sum on fee, 52 million dollars for the audit and the non-audit services provided to the client. Initial allegations focused on the role of the auditors, AA was one of the big five accounting firms in the united states at that time and served Enron for nearly 16 years. The courts documents stated that Enron and Arthur Anderson allegedly categorized hundreds of millions of dollars as increase in the shareholders equity, and hence misrepresented the true credibility of Enron financial statements. Arthur Anderson gig not follow the GAAP principles, and later on was also accused of destroying the records that was not on the physical but computer files and emails. Being proven guilty of after a 6 weeks trail, Arthur Andersen surrendered its accountancy license and were fine 500,000
AICPA Code of Professional Conduct principles prevents vises such as fraud that are experienced in accountancy field. Audit is the best measure of the effect of the fraud that are imposed to investors by accountants. The relationship of the investors and account holders are supposed to be affirmed through auditing to ensure accounting principles are upheld(Weirich, Pearson, & Churyk, 2010). Improper loss of the funds through propagation of the accountant officer should be treated as fraud and criminal activity that should lead to prosecution. Therefore, the paper seeks to relate two fraud cases that have been audited and presenting AICPA Code of
When we talk about the audit profession, we mean truthful and independent opinion about the financial and economic sphere. In the narrow sense, audit is an independent test for the reliability of the information in the financial statement of the company. Auditor is the oldest profession. The Latin word “auditor” means “listener”. It is generally agreed that the historical motherland of audit is England, where in the XIII-XIV centuries, the basic principles of auditing, such as honesty, competence and prudence were formed. In this essay, I would like to examine the role of auditor, their legal and professional requirements, benefits and limitations, and explain why an auditor is important.
Ever since the bankruptcy, many concluded before facts were available to form a reasonable judgment that Andersen was responsible for their actions resulting Enron going bankrupt. "Facts show that Enron officers committed fraud within off-balance sheet partnerships with the active assistance of many prominent financial institutions" (Morrison, Mary Ashby). Evidence indicates that Andersen personnel destroyed duplicate copies of old memos, magazines, and requests for charitable contributions before the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission issued or discussed any subpoena to the firm. In difference, the Department of Justice gave misleading testimony, engaged in escapes, allegedly threatening observers and acknowledged in court that it had failed to review the most crucial evidence, the firms audit papers. Auditors are
In general, auditor responsibility is to express opinion on whether the financial statements are free of material misstatements and presented truth and fairness in all material respect. Auditor will first understand of the entity and its environment, and continue with the planning and perform risk assessment procedure, and also all necessary audit procedure to obtain sufficient appropriate evidence before concludes the audit opinion.
In October, 2001, Arthur Andersen, the supervisor of the Enron account, found himself in deep hot water with the Enron Oil Company in Texas, as the SEC announced that an investigation into the accounting of Enron was pending (Ferrell, Fraedrich, Ferrell, 2011). On November 8, 2001, Enron was forced to present its financial statements of five years to which Andersen was the auditor (Ferrell, 2011). About five hundred and eighty-six million dollars in losses were ascertained and therefore, Enron, was forced into bankruptcy one month afterwards (Ferrell, 2011). By December 2001 Enron filed bankruptcy (Ferrell, 2011). This event triggered a domino effect and as Enron’s accountant, Andersen was charged for obstruction of justice.