On May 21, 2012, the AICPA will have a webcast to provide background on changes to the peer review program – Are You Ready for your Peer Review?
Description of the 2 hour course from the AICPA:
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Webcast to help you get up to speed on peer reviewRead More »
Mandatory peer review in California is being phased in over three years. Current issue of the California Board of Accounancy’s newsletter, Update, has a superb brief article on page 8.
Here is a great one sentence summary:
In July 2011, licensees with license numbers ending in 34 through 66 were notified that they are required to submit a Peer Review Reporting Form to the CBA by July 1, 2012.
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If your mandatory peer review reporting is due July 2012, its time to get startedRead More »
You will have a particular date as the cut off for your peer review. This determines what is included in the population for selecting engagements to review.
A common misunderstanding is to think that the population for selection is those engagements issued during the peer review year.
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CPAs whose licenses end between 34 and 66 received a reminder this week from the CBA that those lucky CPAs need to report by 7-1-12 whether they need to have a peer review.
All CPAs with licenses in that range number have to tell the board whether or not they are required to have a peer review. In one sentence, any firm providing attestation services must have a peer review. What’s the big dea? One of the biggest impacts is this new requirement includes sole practitioners who are not members of the AICPA.
My license is in that range. So I received my letter this week. …
Your peer review will cover A&A engagements.
The work that will be included in your peer review is accounting and auditing engagements, referred to as A&A. This obviously includes all your audits under SAS. It also includes your compilation and review services under SSARS.
Not so obvious is your services under the SSAE rules. This would be all those odd projects like examinations or compilations of prospective financial statements or written assertions, and other agreed-upon procedures.
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Here are a few things to consider.
Cost. That’s a biggie. Remember to consider the direct costs for the review, any travel time, and hotel & airfare if the firm is beyond driving distance. Cost is not the only factor though.
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The California Society of CPAs has a place on their website for peer review which includes a directory of CPA firms that could provide your peer review.
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This is the beginning of a series of posts on how to get started with a peer review of your firm.
Many firms in California are going down this road because the mandatory peer review deadlines arrived June 2011. If your license number ends in 01-33, you already got started. The next one-third of firms (license ending in 34-66) have until June 2012. The remaining firms have until June 2013. The hairsplitting deadline is that the peer review information needs to be submitted by July 1.
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Extensions available!!!
Just a reminder, California now has mandatory peer review. First deadline is rapidly approaching for firms whose first peer review is due July 1, 2011. This would be CPAs whose licenses end in 01 through 33.
The Cal Society has a memo on their website allowing extensions.
See announcement here.
To get an extension, a firm must: …
If you find yourself getting into a jam with submitting your peer review report by the deadline it could be due to several possible reasons.
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Always in a jam because of your peer review deadline? Consider changing your year-end.Read More »
The rules for peer review have a few requirements to help make sure that a peer reviewer keeps some distance when performing a peer review. In other words, independence is required.
Here are some of the specific situations:
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Peer review requires that reviewers maintain independenceRead More »
Under the new rules for a quality control system, CPA firms who have accounting and auditing work (that means any compilations or reviews), must have a policy addressing engagement quality control reviews.
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Here is an idea if you are just getting into the peer review cycle because of mandatory review: pick your peer review cutoff date carefully. This might also help if you already have peer reviews but the timing causes a time crunch.
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Choose your Peer Review year-end cutoff carefullyRead More »
I have completed the course work and am now available to provide Peer Review to CPA firms. …
For California CPAs who perform attestation work, deadline for mandatory peer review is just around the corner. …
Mandatory Peer Review deadline getting really closeRead More »