Details of Australian Securities and Investments Commission procedures for dealing with new audit notifications as a result of the Corporate Law Economic Reform Program have been released.
The new procedures have been put in place as part of the new notification requirements for registered company auditors, audit firms or audit companies arising from the expansion of auditors’ duties under CLERP 9.
Under the CLERP 9 changes auditors must report certain things to ASIC including where the auditor has reasonable grounds to suspect a significant contravention of the Corporations Act, or if someone has attempted to mislead or interfere in the proper conduct of the audit.
Auditors must also notify ASIC of certain conflicts of interest as soon as the auditor becomes aware of the relevant circumstances.
These matters need to be resolved and ASIC needs to be notified within a prescribed time period or the auditor, audit firm or company will cease to be the auditor of the entity and be removed from the database as auditor of the entity by ASIC.
ASIC has developed a fast-track process for dealing with these notifications and such notices can either be emailed to auditor.notification.team@asic.gov.au or mailed to the Auditor Notification Team, Corporate Finance Division, Australian Securities and Investments Commission, GPO Box 9827, Brisbane QLD 4001.
This will allow ASIC to respond to these matters within the required timeframes.
