Calling U.S. Participants: Technical Committee 295 on Audit Data Services
10/07/2019
The American National Standards Institute (ANSI), the U.S. member body for the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), is seeking U.S. stakeholders to participate in ISO Technical Committee (TC) 295 on audit data services.
In May, ANSI issued a request for stakeholders to comment on the Standardization Administration of China (SAC) proposal to transform ISO project committee (PC) 295 into a technical committee to further the work of PC and develop a multitude of standards on audit data services. Standardization in the field of audit data services covers the content specification as well as the collection, pre-processing, management and analysis techniques for the identification, communication, receipt, preparation, and use of audit data.
The initial program of work for TC 295 will cover the following topics:
1. Standards of audit data services of public sector budget, including revenues (except tax) and expenditures.
2. Standards of audit data services of financial reports, including balance sheets, income statements, statements of cash flows, statements of equity and related notes.
3. Standards of audit data services of non-financial enterprises, including enterprise resource planning (ERP) information and customs, tax payment, internal control information; the specifications on implementation in different file formats and for ERP vendors.
4. Standards of audit data services of tax, including taxpayer's basic and transaction information.
5. Standards of audit data services of social insurance, including pension and health insurance.
The plans for the above listed standards specify the data content, pre-processing and validation procedures, data management and analysis techniques.
The current project committee is developing a standard that aims to resolve the common problems that auditors face when requesting data, from various systems, to perform their audit procedures. The information contained in the standard is intended to improve the accessibility and transparency of audit data, standardize the process of collecting audit data, avoid duplicative efforts, and save resources. According to ISO, the worldwide standardization of audit data content and formats will enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of government, internal and external audits, and provide benefits to related stakeholders.
Did You Know?
According to ISO, an audit is an official examination of an entity's financial and finance-related records in order to check that they are accurate. Audit data can encompass public sector budgets, financial reports, nonfinancial enterprises, and tax and social insurance for the purpose of government audit, external independent audit, internal audit and other regulators.
Accountants have recorded business ledgers and balanced books for centuries. In fact, the earliest audit record dates back to ancient Egypt. A new video, developed by TC 295's U.S. TAG Chair Joel Pinkus of KPMG, details the history of audit data services.
For more information, read the proposal for ISO TC 295's technical activity, which describes relevant affected stakeholders (page 8), a listing of countries where the subject of the proposal is important to their national commercial interests, among other information.
Interested participants may contact Kemi Allston to find out more information and get involved with ISO TC 295: [email protected].
