December 2012

Focus is again on Big 4 consulting and independence

More attention is coming to bear on the growing amount of consulting in the Big 4. The HP – Autonomy fiasco has called attention to the issue again.

The volume of consulting work is growing fast.

If you occasionally check in to see what the huge firms are doing, here are four five articles you can browse.

Focus is again on Big 4 consulting and independence Read More »

Want a quick overview of the peer review program?

Going through your first review soon and want to get an idea what’s involved?  Want to figure out how things are working since your last long-ago review?

Check out pages 4 and 5 of the Fall 2012 issue of UPDATE from the California Board of Accountancy. You can find it on this page. A direct link to the PDF is here.

I’ve been a peer reviewer for over a year now and I’m still learning the subtleties of how the program works. I know it is very complicated.  When I walk CPAs through the process, I can tell it is confusing. New forms. New terminology. New report names (pass instead of unqualified).

If you are going through your first peer review or it’s been a long time since you last did so, you’ll find that summary will give you a survey of what’s involved.

Want a quick overview of the peer review program? Read More »

HP’s fraud allegations still a bit vague

I still can’t quite figure out what is in Autonomy’s accounting that was a severe problem and why that led to an $8.8 billion write-off.  That seems to be a common thread in the discussion of HP and Autonomy that I’ve been reading lately.

I won’t go into much detail. Just want to give a few links to leave a trail of the direction things seem to be going.

HP’s fraud allegations still a bit vague Read More »