The Internal Quality Control System at the Office of the Auditor General of Norway

1
The Internal Quality Control System at the Office
of the Auditor General of Norway

• Deputy Director General Øivind Berg Larsen
• The Office of the Auditor General of Norway

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Internal Quality Control

• Why
• How
• Lessons learned

3
The Board of Auditors general
Auditor General
Secretary General
Legal secretariat




Department I (Financial audit) Ministries
of Finance, Government Administration and
Reform, Culture and Church Affairs
Department II (Financial audit) Ministries
of Defence Fisheries and Coastal
Affaires, Agriculture and Food, Environment, Petro
leum and Energy, Transport and Communication
Department III (Financial audit) Ministries
of Justice and the Police, Education and
Research Local Government and Regional Development
, Trade and Industry, Foreign Affairs
Department IV (Financial audit) Methodology Minist
ries of Labour and Social Inclusion, Children
and Equality, Health and Care Services

Performance Audit Dep II Ministries
of Finance, Fisheries and Coastal
Affairs Defence, Culture and Church
Affaires, Education and Research, Agriculture and
Food, Environment, Petroleum and
Energy, Transport and Communications, Foreign
Affairs

Performance Audit Dep I Methodology development
and advice, Government-wide policies Corporate
control Ministries of Labour and Social
Inclusion, Government Administration and
Reform, Health and care Services, Local
Government and Regional Development, Trade and
Industry
Administration Responsibility ICT, Internal admi
nistration and finance, Information and
documentation, International cooperation, Personne
l
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Different control regimes for

• Financial audits (since 2000)
• Performance audits (once only)
• Corporate control (once only)

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The Objectives of Internal Quality Control

• High quality audits
• Consistent use of standards
• Effective use of resources
• Provide an arena for learning
• For those being subject to control
• For those performing the control

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Common to all Quality Control at the OAG

• QC is not part of day to day Quality Assurance
• QC is performed after an audit opinion has been
  formed and sent to the audited body or Parliament
• QC is performed by personnel from a different
  department to the one being controlled
• All sections are subject to QC approximately once
  every four years
• The report from the QC team is sent for comments
  to the section being scrutinised
• The report is reviewed by the Top Management Team
  and is referred to the Board of Auditors General

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The Quality Control process will verify that

• Quality assurance is performed and documented
• Personnel are allocated to the assignments in an
  effective way and according to the priority of
  the audit
• Communication between the audited body and the
  audit team has been timely and correct
• All findings and conclusions are documented and
  can be reproduced for verification purposes

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Specific for QC in Financial Audits

• The Audit program follows logically from the
  Strategic Analysis
• That the Audit Program has been performed and
  documented as planned
• Conclusions of the QC
• Acceptable
• Lacking in part
• Mismatch between findings and conclusions

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Main findings Financial audit of 2006

• Use of new methodology is acceptable
• In some controlled audits it is difficult to
  trace the flow of logic from material risks
  defined to the audit report
• The use of the support tool (Prosit) varies
• Internal quality assurance are not always
  adequately documented

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Specific for QC in Performance Audits

• Checklists /structured interviews on
• Design
• Processes
• Products
• Communications
• Findings All acceptable, but with room for
  improvements in Communications

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