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Yellow Book Auditing CPE For CPAs |
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The Yellow Book standards govern the majority of audits required by government organizations. Whether you’re a CPA or a government auditor, improving your Yellow Book auditing skills can help speed up your professional growth.
By completing Yellow Book audit training, you can ensure that the results of your audits are trustworthy and valid. Although mastering the Yellow Book standards is a quite difficult and time-consuming task, choosing the right Yellow Book CPE courses can help you achieve this goal.
In this post, we’ll discuss all the vital things related to Yellow Book auditing and Yellow Book CPE – the ultimate method to enhance your auditing skills.
Let’s get started!
The Yellow Book provides a comprehensive set of GAGAS (Generally Accepted Government Accounting Standards). With the help of Yellow Book training, you can learn a robust framework to conduct audits of all kinds of government entities, as well as entities that have obtained grants and awards from the government.
The GAO (Government Accountability Office) releases the Yellow Book annually. The last major update was carried out in 2018. Since then, GAO has been adding only technical updates to it.
Yellow Book audit is also known as GAGAS audit. The objective of this audit is to offer an opinion encompassing the financial statement based on GAGAS. It also helps auditors review compliance issues and internal controls.
By completing Yellow Book training, you should be able to do the following:
· Follow the general standards intended to be used by both non-governmental and governmental auditors who conduct audits according to GAGAS
· Address the varying needs of governmental entities
· Learn the reporting standards established by the AICPA Auditing Standards Board
· Learn the reporting standards applicable to performance audits
No matter if you choose Yellow Book self-study courses or other types of online programs to meet your Yellow Book audit CPE requirements, you’ll get to learn several key principles that govern the process of government audits.
Here’re brief overviews of the key principles.
· Application and use of GAGAS
The first thing you’ll learn in Yellow Book auditing courses is the GAGAS and how the framework applies to government audits. You’ll learn the requirements and receive guidance on how to deal with ethics, quality control, professional judgment and competence of auditors, independence, the performance of fieldwork, together with proper reporting.
Performance audits stand for the engagements that offer conclusions or assurance depending on an assessment of sufficient, proper evidence based on stated criteria like defined business practices or specific measures and requirements.
When it comes to performance audits, the Yellow Book mentions that reviewers may also use some other standards together with GAGAS.
· General standards
The Yellow Book mentions general standards for conducting reviews and audits based on GAGAS. These standards encompass the following:
o The application of professional judgment in the work’s performance
o Independence of individual auditors and the audit organization
o Quality assurance and control and external peer review
o The competence of reviewers or auditors
While all these factors play vital roles in Yellow Book auditing activities, the concept of independence is of primary importance. Audit organizations and auditors have to maintain independence to ensure that their findings, judgments, recommendations, opinions, and conclusions remain impartial and considered impartial by relevant third parties having the appropriate information.
Auditors also need to stay away from situations that may lead relevant third parties to conclude that auditors are unable to maintain independence. This means they aren’t capable of providing impartial and objective judgment on the issues related to the process of conducting the audit, as well as reporting of the work.
In the context of maintaining auditor independence, major challenges include organizational independence, external impairments, and internal impairments. According to the revised Yellow Book, there are two fundamental principles that determine auditor independence when reviewing the impact of conducting a non-audit service for an entity that has already been audited. These include:
o The audit organization has to avoid auditing its own work or providing non-audit services in the circumstances wherein the non-audit services play vital roles in the audit’s subject matter
o The audit organization has to stay away from offering non-audit services that encompass making management decisions or carrying out management functions
· Ethical principles
The Yellow Book specifies ethical principles to offer a structure and foundation applicable to a review/audit entity in compliance with GAGAS. According to these principles, an auditor should only take on work that they’re competent to perform while maintaining high quality and following appropriate standards mentioned in the audit report.
Here’re the ethical principles that guide the work of auditors and reviewers and should be addressed and considered by audit organizations.
o Integrity
o Objectivity
o The public interest
o Professional behavior
o Appropriate utilization of government resources, information, and position
· Fieldwork standards applicable to performance audits
You’ll also learn the field work standards and receive guidance on conducting performance audits by taking Yellow Book CPE courses to meet Yellow Book CPE requirements. These standards involve gathering enough amount of appropriate information, supervising staff, planning the audit, and preparing audit documentation.
You’ll learn the following concepts by completing relevant Yellow Book auditing programs.
o Audit risk
o Significance
o Reasonable assurance
Audit risk refers to the probability that the assurance, findings, recommendations, and conclusions of the auditors may be incomplete or inappropriate.
The Yellow Book defines significance as the relative importance applicable to a matter in the circumstance wherein it’s being considered, including qualitative and quantitative factors.
Performance audits need to offer reasonable assurance that the pieces of evidence are enough and appropriate to support the findings and conclusions of the auditors.
· Reporting standards applicable to performance audits
The Yellow Book specifies the content of the report and its form, together with report issuance and distribution. In the context of report issuance, the presentation of enough amount of proper evidence to support the conclusions and findings related to the audit objectives plays a crucial role.
If you’re an auditor who carries out work according to GAGAS, you need to earn a minimum of 24 Yellow Book CPE credits every two years. Your Yellow Book CPE courses have to be directly related to the government environment, government auditing, or the unique or particular environment applicable to the audited entity.
If you’re an auditor who isn’t involved in any kind of directing, planning, or reporting on GAGAS audits or an auditor who isn’t involved in these activities but contributes at least twenty percent of your time to GAGAS audits annually, you need to also earn a minimum of additional 56 CPE hours (this makes it 80 CPE hours total in every two years) to improve your professional competence to carry out audits.
According to the GAO, auditors need to earn Yellow Book CPE in the following two categories:
· Subject matters that relate to the government environment
Yellow Book CPE courses related to this category cover a wide range of subjects. Some of these include regulations, trends, statutory requirements, guidance, criteria, etc. These may also cover topics applicable to the engagement’s subject matter, such as educational, environmental, scientific, medical, or any kind of specialized subject matter.
Topics that are directly connected to the government environment include economic or other pressures or conditions facing governments, the nature of government (operations, structures, and financing), appropriations, common issues related to government financial management, evaluation or measurement of a government program or financial performance, etc.
· Subject matters that help to improve the professional competence of the auditors
This is also a broad category and covers Yellow Book CPE courses that can help enhance your capacity to carry out audits. While pursuing Yellow Book CPE is extremely important for accountants who only do audits, this is also important for accountants who also provide other types of professional services.
For example, in a CPA firm, employees may conduct audits, create estate plans, and prepare taxes. Therefore, the CPE earned by them may help them learn estate laws and corporate and individual taxation rules but may not be counted toward this section of Yellow Book CPE requirements as the subjects don’t help improve their ability to perform audits.
If you’ve already searched online for Yellow Book CPE courses, you’ve certainly seen that these courses are offered in two learning modes: Yellow Book CPE self-study courses and in-person programs.
Let’s take a quick look at each of these learning modes.
· Self-study courses
Undeniably, Yellow Book CPE self-study courses provide the utmost flexibility while offering a cost-effective option to meet your Yellow Book audit CPE requirements. If you can absorb the study materials diligently and clear the final exams at the end of the courses, this’ll be the best option for you.
· In-person programs
Relatively more expensive than self-study courses, Yellow Book CPE in-person programs often need the participants to travel to and from another location to take them. This may not be a feasible option when you have a hectic schedule.
The absence of an instructor and fellow participants often makes it difficult for auditors to complete Yellow Book CPE self-study courses on time. Here’re two strategies that you may find useful.
· Create a study schedule
The first thing is to create a realistic study schedule right from the beginning of your Yellow Book CPE. Although it sometimes becomes difficult, you should try to give your best shot to stick to the schedule. There’re two key advantages of doing this.
First, you’ll get sufficient time to absorb the concepts thoroughly. And second, this’ll help you avoid unnecessary stress when the time of completing your Yellow Book CPE is approaching.
· Take the exams on time
As you already know, you must clear the final exams at the end of the Yellow Book CPE self-study courses to earn your Yellow Book CPE credits. While you may get unlimited attempts, depending on your CPE sponsor, to clear the exams, you shouldn’t wait for the eleventh hour.
If you don’t pass the exams at the eleventh hour and fail to earn your credits on time, it may trigger several negative impacts on your professional career. So, take the exams with enough time in your hands to meet your Yellow Book CPE requirements comfortably.
There’s no need to report your Yellow Book CPE credits to any governing body. The GAO doesn’t need you to report your CPE credits to it.
However, individuals like the peer reviewer and the internal quality control reviewer will be concerned about whether or not an auditor has completed their CPE requirements. This is because they’re responsible for ensuring that the auditors they assign to conduct audits are competent enough to carry out the tasks.
The internal quality control reviewer checks that the auditors earn the required Yellow Book CPE, and the external peer reviewer checks that the auditors are maintaining records and adhering to the requirements properly.
It’s important to note that if you hold a professional certification such as CPA, the certifying body may need you to report your CPE to it periodically. For example, your state board of accountancy may need you to report your CPE credits to it periodically. However, your board of accountancy won’t check whether or not you meet your Yellow Book CPE requirements on time.
Even though you don’t need to report your Yellow Book CPE to anybody, it’s extremely important that you keep all the documents for at least five years from the date of completing the programs. In the case of a random audit, these documents will help you prove that you’ve been meeting your Yellow Book audit CPE requirements diligently.
The Yellow Book auditing processes are complex, and Yellow Book CPE brings you a wonderful opportunity to earn your CPE credits and expand your knowledge at the same time. If you’re searching for high-quality yet affordable Yellow Book CPE courses, be sure to check our course library. In case you want to learn more about our courses, contact us now, and we’ll be happy to be of help.
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