Auditor- a specialist engaged in auditing (checking documents, financial and tax reporting) and consulting activities related to adjustment accounting. The profession is suitable for those who are interested in economics (see choice of profession for interest in school subjects).

According to the legislation of the Russian Federation (Federal Law of 30.12.2008 No. 307-FZ "On Auditing Activity") the auditor (from lat. auditor listening) - individual who has received an auditor's qualification certificate and is a member of one of the self-regulatory organizations of auditors. The profession of an auditor is laborious, complex and interesting at the same time. It requires constant professional development and mastery of a large amount of information. But at the same time, this profession is traditionally one of the most paid and prestigious.

There are private and government auditors. The former work in the interests of the audited company. They, as a rule, check the financial statements for errors and inconsistencies, and give advice. The auditor, who is in the civil service, checks the accounting and tax statements of the organization for the legality of the transactions being carried out, the absence of fraud in the preparation of contracts and the provision of reports, the legitimacy of the channels of income and expenses. The main objectives of a tax audit are to determine the correctness of the calculation of the amount of taxes payable and to prevent possible claims and penalties related to violation of the legislation on taxes and fees.

Audit can be both internal and external. Internal is typical for large organizations with branches. External - for small companies that attract specialists from audit firms.

Responsibilities of the auditor:

• on-site visits to the company where it is necessary to conduct an audit;
• checking the financial and economic activities of the organization;
• audit of accounting documents, books, reports;
• making an opinion, drawing up a report on the work done;
• advice on setting up accounting, the state of financial and tax reporting.

Required professional skills and knowledge

• knowledge in the field of economics, finance;
• impeccable knowledge of financial legislation;
• knowledge of the peculiarities of drawing up financial documentation;
• the ability to identify errors and violations (to be able to distinguish intentional mistakes from unintentional ones);
• the ability to quickly delve into the production process of the audited company;
• knowledge of a foreign language (to work in a prestigious company);
• knowledge of Word, Excel, as well as skills in working with 1C, Garant or Consultant plus.

Also, according to the Code of Ethics of Auditors from 31.05.2007. the basic principles of auditor behavior include:

• honesty;
• objectivity;
• professional competence;
• due diligence;
• confidentiality and professionalism of behavior.

Auditor training

To become a professional auditor, you need to complete special courses, as well as regularly take refresher courses.

On this course, you can get the profession of an auditor remotely in 3-6 months. A diploma of professional retraining of the standard established by the state. Fully distance learning. The largest educational institution of additional prof. education in Russia.

Personal qualities

• a responsibility;
• attentiveness;
• accuracy;
• adherence to principles;
• mobility;
• sociability;
• flexibility;
• attentiveness to details, numbers;
• Analytical mind;
• good memory;
• stability of attention, emotional and volitional stability.

Cons of the profession

• frequent business trips;
• irregular working hours;
• difficult employment without work experience;
• the need to process large amounts of information in a short time;
• lack of room for error (if a violation is missed, and then revealed during a tax audit, the audited company will pay a fine, and the audit firm will lose its reputation);
• vagueness and frequent adjustments to laws and legal documents.

Pros of the profession

• stable demand for professional auditors;
• high salaries of auditors.

Place of work

• audit companies;
• state tax service;
• financial and economic divisions of various companies.

Salary and career

Salary for 08/05/2019

Russia 25000-60000 ₽

Moscow 40,000—150,000 ₽

Auditing activity is permitted by the presence of an auditor's qualification certificate, which is issued by the Moscow Auditing Chamber. According to the legislation, in order to receive it, the following requirements must be met:

• the applicant has passed the qualifying exam;
• by the day of the announcement of the results of the qualification exam, the applicant has at least three years of work experience related to the implementation of audit activities or accounting and preparation of accounting (financial) statements, while at least two of the last three years of the specified work experience must have been employed in audit organization;
• no more than one year has elapsed from the day the Unified Attestation Commission made a decision on the applicant to pass the qualification exam until the day the Moscow Audit Chamber received an application for a certificate from the applicant.

In small Russian firms, the salary and career development of an internal auditor depend on the size of the company and range from 40,000 to 60,000 rubles, in a large company up to 1,500,000 rubles.

Possible career development for a vertical auditor: auditor, senior auditor, head of the audit. Moving horizontally looks like a transition from Russian audit firms to international ones, or as a transition to non-audit firms as an internal auditor.

Profession auditor

Accountant profession

Profession of chief accountant

Profession specialist in IFRS

Training program

General information

About the specialty

The specialty "Accounting, Analysis and Audit" was created to train economists in the field of accounting, analysis and audit. Graduates in this direction will be able to work as accountants, auditors, specialists of economic departments of organizations and enterprises.

About training

Training in this specialty has a pronounced practical bias and is built from simple to complex. The curriculum of this specialty guarantees the receipt of a bachelor's degree, confirmed by a state diploma. The term of study is regulated by the student himself, based on the availability of free time, finances and other personal factors.

List of formed competencies

The graduate must have the following general cultural competencies:

• owns a culture of thinking, is capable of generalization, analysis, perception of information, setting a goal and choosing ways to achieve it;
• able to understand and analyze worldview, socially and personally significant philosophical problems;
• able to understand the driving forces and laws of the historical process; events and processes of economic history; the place and role of your country in the history of mankind and in the modern world;
• is able to analyze socially significant problems and processes occurring in society, and predict their possible development in the future;
• knows how to use regulatory legal documents in their activities;
• is able to logically correctly, reasonably and clearly build oral and written speech;
• ready for cooperation with colleagues, teamwork;
• is able to find organizational and managerial solutions and is ready to bear responsibility for them;
• capable of self-development, improving their qualifications and skills;
• is able to critically assess his own strengths and weaknesses, to outline the ways and choose the means of developing strengths and eliminating weaknesses;
• realizes the social significance of his future profession, has a high motivation to carry out professional activities;
• is able to understand the essence and significance of information in the development of a modern information society, to be aware of the dangers and threats arising in this process, to comply with the basic requirements of information security, including the protection of state secrets;
• owns the basic methods, methods and means of obtaining, storing, processing information, has the skills to work with a computer as a means of information management, is able to work with information in global computer networks;
• speaks one of the foreign languages ​​at a level not lower than the spoken one;
• owns the main methods of protecting production personnel and the population from the possible consequences of accidents, catastrophes, natural disasters;
• owns the means of independent methodologically correct use of methods of physical education and health promotion, is ready to achieve the proper level of physical fitness to ensure full-fledged social and professional activity.

The graduate must have the following professional competencies:

• is able to collect and analyze the initial data necessary for calculating economic and socio-economic indicators characterizing the activities of economic entities;
• is able to calculate economic and socio-economic indicators characterizing the activities of business entities on the basis of standard methods and the current regulatory framework;
• is able to perform the calculations necessary for drawing up the economic sections of plans, justify them and present the results of work in accordance with the standards adopted in the organization;
• able to collect, analyze and process the data necessary to solve the set economic problems;
• is able to choose tools for processing economic data in accordance with the task at hand, analyze the results of calculations and substantiate the findings;
• is able to build standard theoretical and econometric models based on the description of economic processes and phenomena, analyze and meaningfully interpret the results obtained;
• is able to analyze and interpret financial, accounting and other information contained in the statements of enterprises of various forms of ownership, organizations, departments and use the information obtained to make management decisions;
• is able to analyze and interpret the data of domestic and foreign statistics on socio-economic processes and phenomena, to identify trends in changes in socio-economic indicators;
• is able, using domestic and foreign sources of information, to collect the necessary data, analyze it and prepare an information review and / or analytical report;
• is able to use modern technical means and information technologies to solve analytical and research problems;
• is able to organize the activities of a small group created for the implementation of a specific economic project;
• is able to use modern technical means and information technologies to solve communication problems;
• is able to critically assess the proposed options for management decisions and develop and substantiate proposals for their improvement, taking into account the criteria of socio-economic efficiency, risks and possible socio-economic consequences;
• able to teach economic disciplines in educational institutions of various levels, using existing programs and teaching materials;
• able to take part in the improvement and development of educational and methodological support of economic disciplines.

Profession auditor

What does it do

The auditor checks the accounting and tax statements of firms. Income and expenses, deals and contracts - nothing escapes his gaze. Are the financial transactions carried out in accordance with the law? Who is to blame for the mistakes made? Identifying accounting errors, giving management advice on how to correct them is his main responsibility. In fact, he is an auditor, but at the same time an independent entrepreneur and an expert.

Pros of the profession

High profit payment. The income of qualified specialists of audit companies ranges from $ 800 to 1500 and more. Salary usually consists of salary and bonus payments.

Cons of the profession

Choosing this profession, be prepared for constant business trips and "life on wheels." The company that ordered the check can be located anywhere, but you need to work directly on the spot. In a very short time (2-3 weeks) the auditor processes a huge amount of information, and has no right to make a mistake. If the violation is missed, and then "surface" in the state tax authorities, the company will not only pay a fine, but also lose its reputation.

Personal qualities

• analytical thinking
• good memory
• ability to concentrate, perseverance
• penchant for working with numbers and documents
• strong nerves
• integrity and decency

Education

Place of work

Auditors work in numerous specialized audit companies, or they obtain a license and engage in private practice. In any case, a meeting with the auditor is guaranteed for every large company that annually submits financial statements to the state tax authorities. More and more companies are employing an internal auditor - a specialist who checks the financial statements of a particular company.

Career and salary

To work as an auditor, you need a certificate from the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation. It can be obtained by a person with a higher education who has graduated from auditor courses and passed the appropriate exam. Further - private practice or work in an audit firm.

In Russian audit firms, successful specialists are usually former accountants and economists who have worked at enterprises. They are well aware of the interaction of services and departments, they understand the relationship between real production and financial reporting.

Accountant profession

What does it do

There is no accountant in the pure form of the profession. At enterprises, accountants work in the following areas: cash desk, fixed assets, foreign exchange transactions, payroll, warehouse, etc. The chief accountant is responsible for all bookkeeping. In a small firm, one accountant may be responsible for everything.

A qualified accountant who understands all issues of accounting and tax policy is an invaluable employee and the most respected person in the company. However, the responsibility is also high - he is responsible for any error in the calculations.

The work of the accounting department is strictly controlled on the one hand by the employer, on the other hand, laws and regulations of the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Taxes and Levies, which, alas, often contradict each other. Therefore, you need to understand the twists and turns of legislation and be able to communicate with government agencies, for example, tax authorities.

You need to keep in mind the entire financial picture of the enterprise in order to know how any transaction will affect the balance sheet, reporting and CEO bonus.

Pros of the profession

• Demand in the labor market,
• Predominantly rationed working hours,
• You can have additional income, for example, help small entrepreneurs with bookkeeping.

Cons of the profession

• Changes in legislation,
• Contradictions in legislation (for example, tax and accounting),
• Frequent communication with representatives of government agencies, especially with the tax office,
• You have to follow the instructions of your superiors, even if they seem to be incorrect in this situation,
• The activities of an accountant are strictly regulated and leave no room for creativity,
• Accountant errors lead to sanctions, fines, etc.

Personal qualities

People in this profession should be, first of all, responsible and organized, because late submission of the report or the loss of any document can cost the company dearly. In addition, an accountant must love numbers with them he will have to deal with every day, and a mistake can be fatal. A high concentration of attention, scrupulousness and perseverance are also required. It's good to have a good memory and, most importantly, you need to be able to remain silent (since often an accountant has to keep a trade secret).

Education

The employer focuses on work experience, especially in a similar field. Theoretically, a graduate can work as an accountant. College of Economics or special courses. However, those with higher education are more likely.

The accountant must have knowledge in the following areas:

• accounting, tax accounting,
• financial analysis, audit fundamentals,
• accounting legislation,
• information about IFRS,
• basic knowledge of computer, 1C, Excel.

Place of work

In any organization.

Career and salary

Chief accountant, financial analyst, auditor, consultant.

Profession of chief accountant

What does it do

The chief accountant is responsible for organizing and maintaining the accounting and tax records of the company. He is engaged in the preparation of accounting and tax reporting; monitors compliance with the procedure for processing primary and accounting documents, settlements and payment obligations; controls the timeliness of the transfer of tax payments. In addition, the chief accountant is a financial analyst who participates in planning the further development of the organization.

Pros of the profession

Market competition among economists is very high. Therefore, an accountant needs to constantly improve his qualifications.

Also, do not forget that the chief accountant is financially responsible to his management and representatives of the tax authorities. His mistakes can lead to sanctions, fines, etc.

Personal qualities

• leadership skills
• sociability
• a responsibility
• perseverance
• attentiveness
• decency

Education

Higher education in economics. Profile "Accounting, analysis and audit".

Place of work

Firms of any field of activity.

Career and salary

The profession of chief accountant is very popular and highly paid. The level of a specialist's salary depends on the volume of work and the number of legal entities that he leads. The chief accountant has every chance of becoming a financial director, an IFRS manager, and a tax manager.

Profession specialist in IFRS

What does it do

Russia has its own financial reporting standard - the Russian Financial Reporting Standards. If the company decides to enter the foreign market, then it will have to keep reporting in accordance with international standards - IFRS. IFRS specialists help companies to prepare and maintain financial statements in accordance with international standards.

Pros of the profession

Getting the job done requires a high degree of concentration.

Personal qualities

• analytic skills
• accuracy
• attentiveness
• Education:
• Higher education in economics.

Place of work

• foreign organizations with branches in Russia
• Russian companies exploring foreign markets
• Russian organizations receiving loans from international banks or foreign investments

Career and salary

Specialist in IFRS is a demanded and highly paid profession. More and more Russian companies are entering the foreign market. And experts say their number will only grow. IFRS specialists are required in foreign companies with branches in our country, as well as in organizations that receive foreign investment.

The salary of an IFRS specialist depends on experience, skill level and scope of work.

Training program

In accordance with the requirements of the new educational standards, the curriculum must be updated at least once a year. Any discipline can be replaced in it, except for the four compulsory ones: "History", "Philosophy", "Foreign Language" and "Life Safety".

When drawing up the curriculum, RFEI gives preference to new academic disciplines that are known in the West and little known in Russia. This contributes to the passage of European accreditation by the university and facilitates the employment of graduates in successful companies.

• General competence
• Business training

Stage 1

• Starting stage: where to start a business *
• Rapid Business Growth Stage *
• Development of entrepreneurial skills *
• Beginning of accounting
• Fundamentals of Successful Employment *
• Coaching organization *
• Solving business problems *
• The basics of self-education of a businessman *
• Mentoring Basics *
• Metaphysics of Wealth *

Stage 2

• Branding Organization Theory *
• Fundamentals of Accounting *
• Story
• Philosophy
• Right
• Business conversation
• Foreign language
• Microeconomics
• Mathematics
• Information systems in economics

Stage 3

• Statistics
• Macroeconomics
• Management
• Marketing
• Economic and mathematical methods and models
• Econometrics
• Accounting and Analysis
• Taxes and taxation
• Life safety
• Economic analysis theory

Stage 4

• Document management
• Money, credit, banks
• Laboratory workshop on accounting
• Financial accounting
• Optimal decision methods
• Human Resource Management
• Financial statements
• Small business accounting
• HR management
• Psychology

Stage 5

• Audit
• Logistics
• Sales management
• International Standards on Accounting, Reporting and Auditing
• Accounting and analysis of bankruptcies

The final stage

• Physical education
• Educational and industrial practices
• Final state certification

* course of modular discipline

In accordance with the Federal State Educational Standard, a higher educational institution has the right to introduce modular disciplines in order to deepen knowledge and improve the professional skills of a student.

A modular discipline is one or more training courses, including practical ones (using computer programs), that form additional professional competencies.

Features of the profession of an auditor

Every day there are more and more new and consonant modern world professions, at the same time, become obsolete and other specialties become unnecessary. Thanks to the automation of many processes and the emergence of information technologies, today many tasks can no longer be performed by a person, but by a machine. But, nevertheless, only a person can correctly carry out some duties and work, since he has the intellect and the ability to flexibly respond to the situation.

One of the most relevant today is the profession of an auditor, which is quite in demand in the financial world and involves a very high level of remuneration. This is due to the fact that the specialty of an auditor is considered quite complex and involves the performance of a large amount of work. The position is characterized by a considerable number of responsibilities, requirements, among which the main one is the constant improvement of the specialist's qualifications.

The name of the profession comes from the word audit, which means “listening” in Latin. But the adjective “inspector” can most accurately determine the specifics of the profession. Specialists of this profile are extremely in demand today due to several factors - the entry of domestic companies and enterprises into the international market, the influx of a large number of foreign investments into the country, the emergence of a large number of acquisitions and mergers. Each of these situations requires a thorough examination of the state of affairs and assessment.

Regardless of the field in which the auditor works and what direction he has chosen, the specialist must meet many requirements, each of which is very important for the quality performance of professional duties. Today, you can view information about a particular position on any specialized site. , but really grasping the essence of the requirements is not always as easy as it seems.

First of all, the auditor must have a higher education in law or economics, which was obtained in one of the universities in his home country or abroad. Second a prerequisite successful career an auditor is required to have at least three years of work experience in the home country. The auditor must have a certificate issued by one of the training and methodological centers included in the register of the Ministry of Finance. The auditor can receive the document only after completing a forty-hour refresher course. The certificate must be renewed every year.

Depending on the area in which the auditor works, additional requirements may be imposed on him. So, if a specialist checks state companies, he must necessarily obtain a permit in accordance with the established procedure, which makes it possible to work with state secrets.

A practicing specialist must be guided not only by legal acts of state legislation, but also by certain corporate standards - at least, take into account the requirements of the code of ethics of auditors of Russia, observe the principles and requirements specified there.

V.V. Rukin - Director of JSC "Audit - Center", Khabarovsk, Ph.D.

A feature of Russian business is the increased level of risk of work. To a large extent, this also applies to audit. We are used to constantly being in a state of struggle. Overcome the difficulties we are creating. Trying to understand the intricacies of our legislation, to get out of the situations that have arisen on our own and still get our clients out.

But it’s probably time to stop and see: “Do we have a business perspective? Isn't it worth it to drop everything and do something more calm and measured? "

What are these questions related to?

Unfortunately, they are related to the realities of our life. Consumers of our services are losing interest in high-quality audit. Highly qualified specialists lose interest in their work. After all, our work is getting harder every day, and the return is less and less serious. The responsibility on the shoulders of auditors is increasing. After all, we need to draw up a huge number of working files and materials to justify our high-quality work. Today there are 31 Rules (standard) of auditing activities approved by the Government Decree No. 696, plus the Rules approved by the Auditing Commission under the President of the Russian Federation. If earlier, 5 - 7 years ago, I spent 10 - 15 working days on the collection of evidence and carrying out procedures while in the audited organization, and then another 5 days on the preparation of verification materials and on the formation of working documents, today, with the same 10 - 15 days spent in the organization, it takes 15 - 20 days to generate working files and undergo internal quality control. And this is all in the presence of computer programs for auditing.

Audit staff turnover.

If earlier we were rescued by accounting personnel who came from enterprises, today this resource has exhausted itself. Today, specialists from operating production organizations practically do not go to audit companies. You can even talk about the opposite process. Those who came to audit in the 90s and early 2000s leave for the real sector of the economy. The reasons for this lie in a serious outstripping growth in the salaries of the management personnel of organizations, in greater stability and confidence in the future, in the absence of cyclicality in work. The fact that everyone has their own separate office, social protection is much higher than the auditor. In the end, the fact that the chief accountant of an enterprise does not need to spend 25-30% of his working time on a business trip, in some unclear conditions, away from his family.

The average salary of chief accountants ranges from 53,805 rubles in the capital to 21,771 rubles in cities with a population of less than a million people. Such conclusions follow from statistical data prepared by order of the newspaper "Uchet. Taxes. Pravo "Internet - employment service www.job.ru.

Recharge by the younger generation also does not stand the test of life. Getting into audit organizations, young people try to show themselves, their healthy competition as soon as possible, and literally in a year or two they are waiting for a promotion. But the fact of the matter is that this is not possible in every audit organization. In addition, representatives of the real sector of the economy are actively luring specialists from serious audit firms, even with little work experience, immediately offering them not only more financially interesting proposals, but also promising rapid career growth. It's nice, of course, to feel like a forge of personnel, but after all, highly qualified specialists must also work for us.

Summary table of auditors and issued licenses

(compiled according to the data of the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation)

	Quantity, as of
	1.03.05	1.07.05	1.01.06	1.07.06	0 1 .01.07	1.07.07	1. 0 1.0 8
Licenses for the right to carry out audit activities - total
including:
from audit organizations
from individual auditors
Auditor qualifications - total	31.9 thous.	33.6K	35.0 thous.	36.2 thous.	36.7 thous.	37.0 thous.	37, 5 thous.
including:
on general audit
on bank audit
audit of stock exchanges, off-budget funds and investment institutions
for the audit of insurers

According to this summary table, it can be seen that the number of valid licenses increased from March 2005 to January 2008 by only 100 units.

Here, there is also a dangerous tendency towards a decrease in the number of applicants wishing to become auditors. Thus, in 2005 the audit profession grew by 3,100 people, in 2006 - by 1,700 specialists.

The sharp decline in 2007 is especially alarming. For 12 months, the number of auditors has increased by only 800 people, of which 100 applicants have passed for a bank audit. Here we can say that the Ministry of Finance of Russia has canceled a number of auditor certificates, but despite this, we are witnessing a sharp, not to say catastrophic, decline in interest in the profession.

A very serious decline in the growth rate of certified auditors in the last 2 years suggests that specialists have ceased to see the profession of “Auditor” as a meaningful and highly paid profession.

Now let's look at the certification of auditors from the other side, from the side of confirmation of advanced training by public associations of auditors accredited by the RF Ministry of Finance. So in 2006 they confirmed only 3,026 auditor certificates. Thus, taking into account that the first such confirmation is obtained after 4 years, it is possible to reach the total real number of working auditors - 12104. Perhaps someone got involved in their work and missed the deadline for submitting the certificate. But the whole trouble is that now he will never be able to renew his certificate. The auditor has only one way out - to go to study again, take the exam and receive a new certificate.

Recently, the conditions in which candidates take exams for. The exam program itself has become significantly more complicated. This is quite understandable from the point of view of attracting more qualified personnel to audit. But, with all this, with such good goals as increasing the level of preparedness of specialists, it is impossible to bring applicants to time trouble. Everyone who has passed these exams at least once remembered their stressful state well. The result of this is the number of those who successfully passed the exams out of the total number of applicants - a little less than 30%. These results have been on average in Russia for the last 2 - 3 years.

	April 2007		2007 october	December 2007	Total for 2007
	Passed the exam for the certificate
General audit
For bank audit
For the audit of stock exchanges, off-budget ……
For the audit of insurers
TOTAL handed over
	Of them passed to
general audit
bank audit
audit of exchanges, off-budget background ...
audit of insurers
TOTAL passed

According to the draft amendments to the Law “On Auditing”, all auditors will be required to retake the exams for the right to obtain a single certificate.

Imagine, more than 36,000 auditors from all over Russia retake exams for the right to further use their "unlimited" certificate. If we take as a basis the numbers of those who successfully passed the exams for the auditor's certificate in 2007, then we will need only 32 years for this entire procedure (the project allotted 2-3 years for this). If we limit ourselves to the proposed terms, you can imagine what quality we will get, not to mention the possible abuse in the course of both the preparation and passing of these exams.

The program plans to include questions on banking audit, IFRS, etc. Why should a general audit specialist know bank audit (auditors who own a bank audit certificate make up only 3% of the number of general audit specialists, and even fewer are involved in bank audits)? Why does an auditor need to know IFRS, with their logic significantly different from ours, Russian? The share of those who successfully passed the exam for the right to receive the ACCA D diploma ipIFR (rus) is less than 25%. And this is provided that the applicants are engaged for at least 3 - 4 months.

As soon as the amendments to the Law with the above formulation are adopted, the outflow of auditors from the profession will become irreversible. Many auditors with their vast professional experience, who have worked for decades in accounting and auditing, who doubt today, will leave the profession in order to preserve their health and nerves.

Tightening control over the work of auditors

It is a very good deed - improving the quality of the work of audit organizations, from my point of view, has become somewhat one-sided. It became more difficult for auditing organizations to work, which were already trying to comply with the requirements of the Standards (rules) of auditing. They already spend a lot of time and effort on the preparation of working documents and files, incur additional costs buying computer audit programs, hiring methodologists, auditor assistants, etc. At the same time, as “black” and “gray” audit existed in our country, so it remained.

Quality control is carried out by public associations of auditors accredited by the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation. Everything is correct, it is stipulated in many constituent documents these associations. But as soon as the time comes to carry out quality control (at least once every 3 years), the head of an audit firm "not working quite correctly" puts on the merger table a statement on his withdrawal from the list of participants. And it's okay. No responsibility whatsoever.

After all, immediately another association of auditors is ready to accept this organization into its ranks, without asking any questions, without making any checks, even removing the entrance fees and several times lowering membership fees. Thus, "dishonest" audit organizations for the next 3 years can easily "sell" their Conclusions, write fake reports, i.e. do the same thing that they did the previous time.

According to the data of the Ministry of Finance as of December 31, 2006. accredited public associations included 3176 audit organizations (in my opinion, 5-10% of them were double-triple members). At the same time, the number of licenses issued to audit organizations as of December 31, 2006 amounted to 7100 units. The difference is more than 2 times.

Where are these remaining nearly 4,000 organizations? Who works for them, and what conclusions do they issue? Who controls them, and who controls them not on paper, but in real life? This is where the scope for any audit opens up: "white", "gray", "black".

The same managers who at least once passed external quality control of work realized the need for a more attentive attitude to the registration of work results. Nobody sets before the quality controllers the task of ruining the audit organization, forcing it to leave the market. But obliging her to work efficiently, observing all standards is the task of all public associations of auditors and the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation. A way out of this situation would be the adoption of a decision by the Council for Auditing Activities of the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation to prohibit the admission of audit organizations to a public association of auditors accredited by the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation without prior quality control. After all, then you can ask from public associations in full.

Only then will dumping go away, only then will the cost of audit services increase. Not a single auditing organization will agree to audit an industrial enterprise for 30-40 thousand rubles.

According to the Department of State Regulation financial control, auditing, accounting and reporting of the Ministry of Finance of Russia in 2006, within the framework of the external control system of the work of audit organizations, 515 inspections were carried out. These inspections covered 11 - 13% of all audit organizations in Russia. Of these, 93% were checked within the framework of the planned control of auditing public associations accredited by the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation, 6% (31 audit organizations) were checked on behalf of the Ministry of Finance, 1% on the basis of complaints received.

A terrible picture emerges from these figures for the entire normal Russian audit. So, out of 4000 audit organizations that are not part of public associations of auditors, in 2006, at the direction of the Ministry of Finance of Russia, only 36 audit companies were checked (perhaps some of them are part of public associations, there is no decoding of the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation), that is, less than 1%.

Of the 478 scheduled inspections, 281 were carried out by the Audit Chamber of Russia. That is, more than 2/3 of all quality checks of auditors' work were carried out by one public association. And where are the other associations, where are their respective indicators?

Of equal interest to all users of information is the question: “How many audit organizations have not passed the quality control? How many organizations were given time to eliminate the identified deficiencies? " After all, if all 100% of audit organizations that came under the control were able to pass quality control the first time, then this should immediately raise many questions not only from the audit community, but also from the controlling federal body represented by the Ministry of Finance. Russian Federation.

Achievements figures of audit organizations in Russia

Let's look at the data for 2005-2006.

	Audit organization among 4 audit organizations with the highest income	Medium audit firm in Moscow (excluding 4 audit firms with the highest income)		Medium audit organization in other regions (excluding St. Petersburg)
The number of employees
Number of auditors, people
Number of clients, units
Income - total, million rubles
Income from the audit per 1 client, thousand rubles
Income per employee, thousand rubles
Income per 1 auditor, thousand rubles

In 2006 alone, the average number of auditors in organizations decreased by more than 10%. And this is a very serious indicator, we stopped at it above.

The increase in the number of clients, by 60% in Moscow and by 35% in other regions, cannot but rejoice. But at the same time, we see a significant decrease in revenue per customer, by almost 20% in Moscow and by 5% in other regions. We see the same in the total revenue. With an increase in the total number of customers (here we take regional companies) by 37.5%, we see an increase in revenue of only 20%. If we take into account inflation, then the decrease in revenue per customer will be even more significant. It should also be remembered here that at the end of August 2005, 8 new standards for auditing were approved. Their implementation at the end of 2005 and in the course of 2006 not only did not facilitate the work of the auditor, but significantly complicated it. Consequently, the actual verification and processing of materials began to take more time than was previously required. And the question immediately arises: “How did such a decrease become possible? Where is intelligence? "

Personnel of audit organizations:

					Saint Petersburg		Other regions
Distribution of auditors in Russia in%
Share of auditors in the total number of employees,%

Today we can say that the auditor is still the main character of the audit organization, but he is actively pressed by representatives of other professions.

Thus, in the regions, the auditor takes the leading role among the personnel, but there is a sharp tendency towards a decrease in the share of auditors in the total number of employees of audit companies. In 2006 alone, the ratio of auditors to the number of employees of an audit organization decreased by almost 15% in Moscow and by 8% in the regions. In addition, the difference in the approaches of HR services is clearly visible. So if in Moscow the share of auditors is 42.3%, in other regions - 55.7%. The same ratio suggests that Moscow has a wider range of various services, not only audit.

Total revenue of audit organizations for 2004-2006 (million rubles)

Total income

From 2006 revenues:

9,828.8 million rubles (29.6%) accounted for 4 audit firms with the highest income,

8,116.63 million rubles. (23.6%) are accounted for by the remaining 46 largest audit organizations,

RUB 16,447.07 million (46.8%) accounted for all the remaining audit organizations in Russia (if we take by the number of licenses issued, there are 6550 of them, if we take 4233 units according to expert estimates).

If we look at the “Rating of audit and consulting groups based on the results for 2006” conducted by the “Expert” agency, we will see an even greater stratification of auditors. Thus, the share of 150 audit and consulting groups accounts for more than 27 billion rubles. Taking into account the associated members of these groups, their number will be 1138 units. Thus, the share of the remaining 5,462 audit organizations accounts for a little more than 7 billion rubles. If we continue the calculation further, we will see that the average annual revenue of an audit organization, which is not part of the 150 largest, will amount to 1,275 thousand rubles.

The cost of 1 person / hour of the auditor's work in 2005 - 2006 (with a 40 hour work week):

I am glad that in 2006 we see a significant increase in the cost of 1 person / hour of the auditor's work. But I did not even suspect, until I made the above calculations, how low-paid our work is.

Here I would like to dwell on dumping. After all, we ourselves drove ourselves into a corner, estimated our work 3 orders of magnitude lower than it is worth. In the early 2000s, government agencies offered to conduct an initiative audit at a more or less reasonable cost. We, the auditors, ourselves lowered this cost several times, just to get the order. At tenders for the selection of auditors, the range of price offers diverged by 8-15 times and the cheapest offers were passed.

Until today, little has changed. Yes, the Government Decree No. 706 appeared, which laid down the anti-dumping mechanism, but it applies to a small part of the audited organizations. Otherwise, everything remains as before. Until we ourselves begin to fight against auditors who work at the lowest prices, which completely disqualify our profession, we will never be able to get the respect of the business community back for us. Why pay auditors a decent payment for their services, if every second of them is willing to work for an amount 2 - 5 times lower than any reasonable price?

What should small audit firms do? From my point of view, they can only survive by combining several regional companies.

Is there a place for regional audit organizations in the market?

At the moment, there is an active ousting of small regional audit companies from the market, and this market is shrinking. This is especially facilitated by contests held in the Center, in which regional specialists cannot get into. The accreditation procedure at various holdings, ministries exists solely to create obstacles to other auditors and to promote their own.

The big problem for all regional auditors is the business redeployment process. There is an active redistribution of the market, a change in the owners of organizations. Not a single head of a regional audit company can be sure that a client with whom he has been successfully working for several years will not leave him after he is “absorbed”. And this is becoming a serious problem for all regional auditors. After all, they knock out support from under their feet. The takeovers are not the kiosks at the crossroads, but the largest regional enterprises that live and produce profitable products. These are the ones that hold the regional audit market. The consequence of the redistribution of the market is the increasing centralization of audit.

Distribution of audit organizations in Russia (in%):

			Saint Petersburg		Other regions

More than a third of all audit organizations are located in Moscow. They employ almost 40% of all Russian auditors.

Place in the market of the first 50 audit organizations in terms of income for 2005-2006 (in%):

	4 audit firms with the highest income		The rest 46 organizations
Share of income in total income of all audit organizations
Share of income from auditing in total income from auditing of all audit organizations
Share of auditors in the total number of auditors working in all audit organizations
Share of clients whose reports are audited in the total number of such clients of all audit organizations

What's interesting can be seen in this table:

The decline in the share of audit in the total revenues of the largest companies,

1% of clients whose financial statements are audited in 2006 by 4 largest organizations give them a revenue amounting to 22.9% of the total revenues of all audit organizations in Russia,

1.3% of all auditors in Russia generate income that is 29.6% of all auditors' income. The revenue generated by one such auditor is almost 23 times higher than the average revenue attributable to the average Russian auditor.

Are other Russian auditors really so illiterate that such distortions are obtained? Or the reason is that the work of an average auditor Russian organization valued so low?

Audit reports issued during the statutory audit:

Types of issued audit reports	Share in the total number of issued audit reports,%
Issued audit reports of all types
including
with the expression of an unconditionally positive opinion
with a qualified opinion
with negative opinion
disclaimer
with the expression of doubts about the possibility of continuing the activity

This table personally leads me to sad thoughts. Taking into account the complexity of our legislation regulating accounting and tax accounting, 1 - 1.1% of the issued opinions with the expression of a negative opinion seem to be more than strange. Our experience in auditing and issuing negative opinions suggests that the number of negative opinions should be at least an order of magnitude higher.

No less strange look 0.7% of all conclusions expressing doubts about the possibility of continuing to work. Any simple analysis of the financial and economic activities of the audited enterprises will show that the indicators of many of them are below the extreme recommended levels. Not to mention those companies whose net assets are often below the authorized capital, and not forgetting about those who have them in the red.

These figures indicate that audit reports are by no means always given objectively.

The market law says that investments (money) go to areas that can be profitable. Let's see what the figures for the age of audit firms say in 2006:

The figures show that over the past 2 years, businessmen have stopped believing in the audit market and assess it as one of the most congested and risky, one of the most difficult in terms of business development.

Unfortunately, the analysis of the information provided by the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation and posted on the website of the Ministry is not encouraging.

A lot in leveling the current situation depends on you and me. But if we diligently avert our eyes, be afraid to tell each other the truth, hide our heads in the sand, then the situation will only get more complicated, and then we will have only one way out - to leave this market.

Ways to get out of this situation, my vision:

Take active steps to speed up the passage in the State Duma of amendments and additions to Law 119 - FZ "On Auditing",

Representatives of public associations of auditors to agree on the wishes of their members with the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation and to prevent the introduction of requirements for retaking exams for the right to work in audit, on the creation of a compensation fund,

To transfer the vector in the struggle of public associations of auditors of Russia from discrediting another public association to the field of mutual cooperation in order to increase the status of the profession of an auditor,

On behalf of the APR, come up with a proposal for the Ministry of Finance of Russia to more actively carry out quality control of audit organizations that are not members of public associations of auditors,

Contact all public associations of auditors accredited by the Ministry of Finance with a recommendation to introduce a preliminary system of quality control of the work of incoming audit organizations and auditors (taking into account the requirements of the new Regulation on licensing of audit activities),

To develop in public associations of auditors a system of selective rechecking (no more than 5%) of the external quality control of the work of audit organizations, to carry out this control by the staff of the association's staff,

Develop a table of the minimum cost of an audit for organizations of various types of activity (take the work of appraisers as a basis), approve the minimum cost of 1 hour of work of an auditor,

To approve at a meeting of representatives of public associations of auditors of Russia the developed table with a recommendation to use its data in the work of its members,

Subsequently, control the quality of the audit conducted at dumping prices,

Take measures for additional quality control of those audit organizations that, based on the results of the audit of 2006 or 2007 financial years, did not issue a single modified auditor's report expressing a negative opinion.

The profession of an auditor is to check accounting and tax reporting, identify errors in the financial activities of companies and provide consulting support to eliminate any deficiencies found.

The auditor is translated from Latin as “a listening person”. In the old days, the best students of theological seminaries were called auditors, who, on behalf of their mentors, checked other students for the assimilation of the material they had learned.

The emergence of audit is associated with the desire of the owners of the enterprise to evaluate the work of their subordinates involved in its management. The interests of both do not always coincide. In the event that the owner of the company has doubts about the work of his high-ranking subordinates, he conducts an independent audit and gets a real picture of the company's management.

The first auditors appeared in the 19th century. European stock companies needed competent due diligence and consulting support. In Russia, auditors appeared during the time of Peter I and combined the duties of clerks, secretaries and prosecutors. The economic crisis of 1929-1933, which affected almost all countries of the world, increased the market demand for audit services. At these stages, the auditors were mainly engaged in the verification of documents and the formation of financial statements. Already in the second half of the last century, the profession began to acquire new features: along with checking accounting documents, auditors began to engage in consulting activities and internal control of companies' work. Today, the work of auditors in all countries of the world is subject to clear standards and consists of a number of functions aimed at putting things in order in the financial and budgetary activities of organizations.

According to Russian legislation, audit activities are carried out by both individuals and legal entities licensed to engage in such activities. The profession requires certain skills and deep knowledge in the field of economic, tax and financial legislation, Russian and Western accounting systems, rules for conducting inspections and audits, and drawing up reports. is aimed at ensuring the financial stability of the organization and identifying errors in its accounting. The external auditor conducts a mandatory or initiated audit of the organization on request, receiving a certain fee for his services, and the internal auditor is part of the staff of the company and carries out an audit of the organization in which he himself works. Of course, the first is more independent, and there is no doubt about the reliability of his conclusion.

For those who have decided to make auditing their main profession, you should stock up on perseverance, attentiveness and patience. A penchant for painstaking work, an analytical mindset for processing documentation and digital material, a good memory, a high level of responsibility are the fundamental qualities for comprehending this profession. Having acquired some experience, professional skills and a good reputation, you can count on decent wages and high bonuses. The auditor's work is directly related to travel and business trips: the client's company can be located anywhere, but the audit has to be carried out on the spot. In a relatively short time, the auditor is forced to work through a large amount of information, do not miss important details and avoid mistakes.

The auditor is a general specialist. He can perform the functions of an accountant, auditor, work in the economic, financial departments of an enterprise, and, if desired, become a good teacher.

Most large companies employ internal audit specialists. Previously, they were simply called auditors. These professions have a lot in common, but the auditor, in contrast to the auditor, allows you to correct the identified errors, suggest ways to correct them, assist in maintaining financial accounting and inform how to avoid unjustified expenses for the enterprise.

Due to the unstable economic situation and imperfection legislative framework the demand for qualified auditors is quite high. A qualified expert in his field with solid experience in this field will not go unnoticed and has every chance to make a brilliant career.