The problem area was identified due to the fact that research within internal audit is fragmented and insufficient, simultaneously to internal audit becoming more common in the public debate. Crises and scandals in companies such as Enron in the US and Skandia in Sweden have resulted in new regulations regarding how companies should be governed. These regulations have been established in Sarbanes Oxley Act (SOX) in the US, and in Sweden the Swedish code for corporate governance will be implemented in 2005. The regulations imply that companies must provide sound internal control and to accomplish that, companies should have an auditing and consulting internal audit function. The Swedish code for corporate governance denotes that companies can decide to comply or explain why the code is not complied.

Energy awareness is growing among the Swedish population and a one­?to­?two-family dwelling can save energy. The purpose of this paper is to design a tool that helps these home owners reduce their energy costs.The paper develops a model that gives them an indication of how much energy they can save. For the majority of homeowners, the next step in the quest to reduce theirs is most likely an energy audit. Therefore, information to help home owners to get a good energy audit performed is included in the model.A prototype running the operating system iOS is created and validated against existing models, as well as an energy audit. .

On November 1st 2010 the obligatory audit was removed in Sweden for small companies. What factors influence such companies to have their financial reports audited, and what factors exert the strongest influence. Purpose: The authors would like to investigate factors that affect companies with voluntary audits in Skåne län to continue with the audit. The authors also wish to examine the factors that have the strongest impact on the choice to adopt auditing. Method: A quantitative study has been conducted in which aquestionnaire was sent to companies in Skåne Län Conclusion: The factors that affect smaller companies to continue with audit are as follows: Accounting quality, cost, creditors (loans), suppliers / customers, the tax office and distort competition.

Considering that the price and demand for energy gradually has risen over the past decade and a wider discussion about the human impact on the environment has become increasingly more important and given a clearer role in modern society. This has contributed to increased incentives to reduce the use of fossil fuels and increase the use of renewable energy.The agriculture currently accounts for 20 % of Sweden's total greenhouse gas emissions. A way for an agricultural company like Wapnö AB to reduce their emissions could be to utilize existing renewable energy sources within their own premises.The report's aim is to create an energy audit of Wapnö?s existing energy system and how it changes with a future biogas plant in operation. The energy audit is used to illustrate how the company?s climate footprint could change.

AbstractThe tax authority has an obligation to ensure that all tax cases are adequately investigated according to 40:1 SFL. In order to fulfill this obligation the tax authority has a number of investigation options. The most common form of investigation is so- called desktop investigations, which means that the tax authority will send written inquiries or injunctions to taxpayers. The most intrusive and resource-intensive form of investigation is audit. The general rule is that the tax authority?s auditor may examine all accounting records and other documents related to the business.

Title: The dynamics of the Audit expectation gapIntroduction: The audit expectations gap is the difference that exists between what auditors and users of accounting information expects an independent auditor to do. Since the definition arose in 1974, much research has been done about the gap. What is relatively unexplored is how the gap changes over time within a country, and how it is affected by external events. This lack of knowledge has motivated this study.Problem: How has the audit expectation gap changed in Sweden, from the emergence of the definition until today? In which way have corporate scandals and legislative changes affected the gap?Purpose: The aim is to identify and create an understanding of how the audit expectation gap has changed in Sweden.

On November 1st 2010 the obligatory audit was removed in Sweden for small companies. What factors influence such companies to have their financial reports audited, and what factors exert the strongest influence. Purpose: The authors would like to investigate factors that affect companies with voluntary audits in Skåne län to continue with the audit. The authors also wish to examine the factors that have the strongest impact on the choice to adopt auditing. Method: A quantitative study has been conducted in which aquestionnaire was sent to companies in Skåne Län Conclusion: The factors that affect smaller companies to continue with audit are as follows: Accounting quality, cost, creditors (loans), suppliers / customers, the tax office and distort competition.

Introduction: 1 November 2010  came the amendment about the audit requirement into force. The amendment concerned only micro-enterprises. The most common form offinancing for micro-enterprises are bank loans, therefore the banks play a major role in the business and wellness of micro-enterprises.Purpose: Purpose of this paper is to examine if the credit assessment has been affected by the removal of the audit requirement for micro-enterprises.Method: This study will be conducted by a qualitative study in the form of interviews. Five interviews were conducted, with four respondents from the large banks and    one respondent from Almi Företagspartner.Conclusion: All respondents agreed that the audit is seen as a mark of quality, some lenders will continue to request it from the micro-enterprise while other lenders look at other factors such as ownership, relationship or business concept..

To succeed, and make money at your animal production you need to feed your animals with high quality fodder. Other condition to succeed is that you keep your production costs at a minimum. To be able to produce baled silage at a low cost it?s very important that the bales have a high density. Density is measured in kg dry matter (DM) per cubic meter. The purpose with this report was to learn more about making silage in round bales and to how much the bale density varies between different brands of round balers.

The purpose of this study is to describe and analyze how auditors are affected by quality controls and if audit practice changes because of quality controls. To fulfill the purpose of this study there has been interviews made with five auditors. The conclusion by this study is that the interviewed auditors work practices are affected by quality controls and that the extent and effect depends on the auditor and the office that the auditor works in. The auditors who worked as quality reviewers at the agencies where they are employed at, we felt that they were more secured in the response towards quality controls. This may be because they are quality reviewers themselves and they know what the quality control requires and what must be met to be approved.

The independent audit function plays an important role in our modern society as it strengthens the credibility of information given out by firms. A fundamental condition for the maintenance of confidence towards the audit function is the auditor?s independence. This phenomenon has been acknowledged threw several well-known audit scandals during the last decade, including the classical Enronscandal. In the repercussions of these huge auditing scandals, governments all over the world were now founding more restrictive rules and laws about audit independence.

An information audit identifies, among other things, organizations information resources, the information flow and the needs of the information users. The purpose of this masters thesis was to describe the management of information within a local unit of Borås municipality by putting an information audit-method in practice. The focus was on three issues: What information needs could be seen in the organization? How does the information flow through the organization? How does Sugan Henczels seven-stage model serve as a tool to map the management of information within the local unit? The study only described the situation at a certain time at the chosen organization. The seven-stage information audit model was revised and adjusted to the studied organization by only carrying out four of the seven steps: Planning, Data collection, Data analysis and Data evaluation.

Several industrial scandals, especially those about Enron and WorldCom, have lead to an intense debate about the independent audit and the independent auditor. A substantial part of the auditor?s income originates from counselling, and therefore the role of the auditor may be seen as double, and the auditor?s objectivity may be questioned. In the year of 2002, a new Auditors Act was legislated in Sweden. In the 21 § of the act, a model based on principles was introduced, to test the auditor independence in every single case.

Background: An accountant is supposed to secure that the information from a company is true and fair. Recently consulting, or giving advice, has grown to be a major part of an accountants daily work particularly in smaller companies which may have insufficient financial competence themselves. This means that an accountant occupies two parts, as an independent reviewer and as an initiated advisor, which have caused controversy. Purpose: The purpose is to outline and explain how the accountants and audit customers regard an eventual discrepancy between performing the audit and consulting, and to give suggestions how to manage this. The purpose is also to define what customers perceive as quality in consulting an auditor.

Title: Competition for small audit firms ? a qualitative study on possible competitive strategies and how the upcoming changes will influence competition on the audit market    Subject: Auditing Tutor: Margareta Paulsson  Authors: Per Dahlström and Martin Holmberg Purpose: The purpose of this study is to develop an understanding how smaller auditing firms use competitive strategies and why. The result aims to work as a support for owners and leaders of audit firms as they make decisions of how to compete in the future. We would also like to explore how smaller audit firms view the change of the mandatory audit, that is, our intentions are also to examine how they think the consequences on the market will be and their view on its affect on the competition of the market.    Methodology: Our methodological approach was characterized by a hermeneutic approach in order to explain and understand why the smaller audit firms do what they do. Our approach is a combination of inductive and deductive as it allows us to develop an understanding of the subject, then gather our empirical data and from that draw valid conclusions.