New AICPA Audit Quality Centers Focus on Government and Employee Benefit Plans

The Employee Benefit Plan Audit Quality Center and the Government Audit Quality Center will be Web-centric voluntary membership organizations for CPA firms that practice in these specialized areas.

The new centers continue the AICPA’s commitment to strengthening the quality of government and employee benefit plan audits. Over the years, the AICPA has worked with the Department of Labor and the U.S. General Accounting Office to enhance the Institute’s practice monitoring programs, develop training courses and tools such as audit guides and checklists and communicate to members about audit quality issues through conferences, audit risk alerts and other publications.

The new centers will provide practitioners with a home to share best practices and find guidelines and tools to further improve audit quality. Members will be expected to participate in enhanced peer review and develop firm-wide training and quality control programs.