Auditors’ liability capping : impact on listed companies’ financial statements integrity, audit market and its profession in the United Kingdom (A study of audit reforms in the UK)
Purpose: The UK government is reluctant to adopt auditors’ professional liability capping strategy as recommended by the European Union in 2008 based on fear of poor audit quality. Therefore, this study aims to investigate whether auditors in the UK will relax their professional scepticism attitude towards financial statements integrity; whether capping can help to demonopolize the current audit market in the UK that is currently dominated by the big four audit firms; and whether audit profession can survive and grow in the face of colossal legal claims against auditors in the UK through a qualitative empirical study. Methodology/Methods: The underpinning philosophical stance of this study is interpretivism as the topic centres on human behaviours. It has collected and analysed primary data based on survey of 2000 population and 30 semi-structured interviews among audit staff in the UK, using descriptive statistics and as a means of data analysis.Significance: This study will promote a non-monodirectional audit reform in the UK through policy makers.Contribution: This study revealed that auditor’s liability capping is the panacea to the existing large legal claims against auditors in the UK. Therefore, the study has uncovered the existing knowledge gap regarding the impact of auditors’ professional liability capping on listed companies’ financial statements integrity, the audit market and audit profession in the UK within the ambit of numerous literatures on the topic.Keywords:auditors’ liability capping, audit market, and audit quality.
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