Audit and Assurance Essentials: For Professional Accountancy Exams - Softcover

Bagshaw, Katharine

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1119968798 ISBN 13: 9781119968795

Publisher: Wiley, 2013

Synopsis

An accessible beginner’s guide to the fundamentals of audit and assurance 

Audit and assurance is a basic and vital aspect of the financial world and a key element of all professional accountancy programs. Whereas professional training on the topic frequently immerses students in too much detail while glossing the basics, this book begins with the fundamentals and expands to cover the details in a more measured way. With practical examples and end-of-chapter examples, External Audit and Assurance Essentials breaks down a difficult and challenging field of professional accounting.

About this title

About the Author

Katharine Bagshaw, London, UK has 20 years of experience as a technical specialist in ISAs and wrote some of the first UK training materials on ISAs in the mid 1990s. She trained with and has worked for firms that are now Ernst & Young, KPMG and PwC.
Katharine taught auditing to ICAEW, ACCA, CIMA and CIPFA students for over 15 years in the UK, Eastern Europe, Africa and the Far East and she served as ACCA’s auditing examiner for three years.
Since 2000, Katharine has worked for ICAEW’s Audit and Assurance Faculty with responsibility for ICAEW’s extensive ISA Implementation program. She is currently Secretary to its ISA Implementation group and to ICAEW’s PCAOB Panel. She is also Technical Adviser to a UK representative on IFAC’s SMP Committee and has written numerous articles for the professional press. She is the author of several specialist auditing publications on ISAs.

From the Back Cover

Understanding auditing and assurance is essential not just for practitioners, but for anyone in a finance role. Auditing and assurance are key elements in many professional accountancy courses. However, the pass rates for these papers are often significantly lower than for other papers at the same level. Much of the available material is unclear and confusing because of an excessive level of detail, in an attempt to be comprehensive. This can make it difficult to master the basic concepts.

This user-friendly book covers the key concepts of professional auditing and assurance syllabuses, including those of the ACCA and ICAEW among others, with an emphasis on core knowledge and basic application skills. It is designed as a working primer in the basic concepts of audit and assurance, which are explained and illustrated in clear and simple terms.

Key features are:

• An introduction to each section explaining why the student should read it, what is important, what sort of questions come up in the area, and how students can stand out from the crowd.
• Practical examples that can be used in the exam room.
• Questions at the end of each chapter.
• A section on study skills and exam technique.
• Clear, understandable coverage of the increasingly important concept of assurance.
• Coverage of International Standards on Auditing (ISAs) relevant to students taking International and UK variant papers with notes on the differences between UK and International standards, where they still exist.
• A companion website containing an additional bank of questions, more material on current issues and other exam-related material.

“Katharine's willingness to share her knowledge of how to perform well in auditing exams makes this book invaluable for anyone taking them.”―Guy Loveday BSc (Econ) FCA, director of PTP Ltd, widely known as both a CPD trainer and former examination tutor

“Katharine knows how to get students through auditing exams!”―John Selwood ACA, lecturer and trainer on auditing

From the Inside Flap

Understanding auditing and assurance is essential not just for practitioners, but for anyone in a finance role. Auditing and assurance are key elements in many professional accountancy courses. However, the pass rates for these papers are often significantly lower than for other papers at the same level. Much of the available material is unclear and confusing because of an excessive level of detail, in an attempt to be comprehensive. This can make it difficult to master the basic concepts.

This user-friendly book covers the key concepts of professional auditing and assurance syllabuses, including those of the ACCA and ICAEW among others, with an emphasis on core knowledge and basic application skills. It is designed as a working primer in the basic concepts of audit and assurance, which are explained and illustrated in clear and simple terms.

Key features are: 

• An introduction to each section explaining why the student should read it, what is important, what sort of questions come up in the area, and how students can stand out from the crowd.
• Practical examples that can be used in the exam room.
• Questions at the end of each chapter.
• A section on study skills and exam technique.
• Clear, understandable coverage of the increasingly important concept of assurance.
• Coverage of International Standards on Auditing (ISAs) relevant to students taking International and UK variant papers with notes on the differences between UK and International standards, where they still exist.
• A companion website containing an additional bank of questions, more material on current issues and other exam-related material.

“Katharine's willingness to share her knowledge of how to perform well in auditing exams makes this book invaluable for anyone taking them.”—Guy Loveday BSc (Econ) FCA, director of PTP Ltd, widely known as both a CPD trainer and former examination tutor

“Katharine knows how to get students through auditing exams!”—John Selwood ACA, lecturer and trainer on auditing

Edition details

• Publisher: Wiley
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1119968798
• ISBN 13: 9781119968795
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 512