Since 1999 auditors have an obligation, according to 42-44 §§ aktiebolagslagen (2005:551), to report suspicions of crime. The obligation to report means that the auditor is legally obliged to report any suspicious economical crime potentially committed by the executive director or a member of the board to a district attorney. Prior to the enactment it was almost impossible for the auditor to report any criminal suspicion due to the professional confidentiality. According to Ekobrottsmyndigheten the number of crime suspicion reports filed by auditors has reduced by 50 percent in the Stockholm-region between 2006 and 2010. However, after the enactment crime suspicion reports increased successively each year.

The recent accounting scandals in large companies in both USA and Europe, such as Enron and Scandia, have led to a huge debate about the quality of financial reports approved by auditors who, at the same time, offer consultancy service to their audit clients. Many researchers and experts argued that there is a role conflict when an auditor offers consultancy service to audit clients. They argue that the main duty of an auditor is to verify the truthfulness of the company's financial statements. Giving consultancy service to the audit clients will impair the auditor's role to examine the company's books independently because of the economic bond between auditors and audit clients.As a result of the Enron scandal, the legislators in the USA have made restrictions to how auditors provide non-audit service to audit clients. However, the legislators in Sweden, unlike the US, did not choose to introduce such restrictions.

In 2010 mandatory audit was revoked for small and medium sized companies in Sweden. At the same time the authorization for accounting consultants was established with the aim of raising the knowledge and status of the profession. Even though The Swedish Companies Registration Office has discovered more errors in the accounting after the mandatory audit was eliminated, it especially concerns those companies who does not have neither an auditor or an accounting consultant. One of the reasons often mentioned to be audited is the auditors role when it comes to lending decisions. Our empirical studie show that the auditors most important function, being unbiased, is not what is of greatest importance for the credit institutions.Instead it was professional skills, and for small and medium enterprises (SME) it was consulting they requested the most.

Problem: That the stakeholder?s expectations don´t answer to what auditors can and may do have been a problem for several years. This problem was defined for the first time by Liggio at 1974. Since 1974 there have been several researches about the expectation gap for auditors.Purpose: The purpose of our study is to research what the audit effort in HQ Bank means for the expectation gap.Theory: The theories in our study discuss the audit profession, the definition of the expectation gap, how trust develops between individuals, the regulations that the authorities discuss and a review of earlier researches in this subject.Method: We have done a qualitative study in which we interviewed approved auditors at PwC and Convensia in addition we interviewed the chief lawyer at the Swedish financial supervisory authority to answer our purpose.Conclusions: The conclusion of our study is that the expectation gap exists between the auditors and the stakeholders. Another conclusion is that the incidents in HQ Bank have influenced the expectation gap in a negative direction, to reduce the expectation gap we suggest that adjustments of the regulations must be done and that the auditors themselves must inform their stakeholders what auditors can and may do..

Aim: Auditors objectivity is an obvious part of auditing, but there is doubts and hesitation in society today because of the corporate scandals that have occurred in recent years. Several researchers suggest that auditors actions and behaviors is connected to the ethical climate within the organization. A relationship that also affects auditors objectivity and independence. This thesis aims to investigate how the ethical climate influence auditors choice of relationship to their clients, by choosing a relational and close relationship or a transactional and distanced relationship. And if the client approach have an effect on the auditors objectivity.Method: A survey was conducted among 232 certified accountants in Sweden.

The milk production per cow has increased considerably during the last 50 years and due to the breeding for higher milk production also brings decreased reproduction efficiency. In a Swedish study 1996 it was shown that on average only half of all estruses were detected. Every time a farmer fails to detect oestrus it costs the farmer about 1200 Swedish crones and the need of means of detecting oestrus is therofore large. With this study we wanted to investigate if heart rate respectively crystallisation of vaginal mucus (arborisation) could be useful means of detecting oestrus. We monitored two oestrus cycles in four heifers.

As the media attention society on the world climate change, interest in the environment and social impact has increased. This has in turn made even more companies choose to maintain a sustainability report that contains the three aspects of economic, environment and social impact. The demand for sustainability reports has increased among stakeholders. It has made the companies that establish this form of reports experienced economic benefits. The sustainability report than became a useful way to compete among businesses.

In the European Convention and the EU charter the principle ne bis in idem is provided, which implies that a person can not be tried or punished twice for the same offense. Since the European Convention was incorporated into Swedish law in 1995 the principles application has been discussed in tax law. Several cases have been examined by the European Court and the Supreme Court (HD) in order to determine whether dual punishment has occurred in the national rules concerning tax surcharge, tax crime and accounting fraud. The judicial trials have brought different assessments concerning the matter, which have resulted in a lack of clarity on the application of the principle in Swedish law.The thesis purpose is to clarify whether the principle ne bis in idem is applicable on the relationship between tax surcharge and tax crime, and the relationship between tax surcharge and accounting fraud.The authors' conclusion is that the principle ne bis in idem is applicable on the relationship between tax surcharge and tax crime because both sanctions are considered criminal in nature and concern the same crime, since they are based on substantially the same circumstances. Furthermore, the principle ne bis in idem is considered applicable on the relationship tax surcharge and accounting fraud, because both sanctions are criminal in nature and their circumstances have a connection, therefore they are considered as the same crime..

Swedish accountants are, amongst other laws, controlled by a couple of so called duties. One of those is the professional secrecy, which guarantees the safety of company secrets and other important information that the accountant needs to know but shouldn?t tell anybody. Since 1999 Swedish accountants also need to follow the regulations of the reporting duty. In short, this means that in some cases of suspected crime within a company, auditors are obliged to report this to the authorities.

Background: Non-profit organizations have a large and significant role in Swedish society and Thunberg (2006) choose to express it like Sweden stops without nonprofit effort. But in several non-profit organizations, and then perhaps especially in sports, there exist problems with the economy. Tate (in Vermeer, Raghunandan & Dana, 2009) explains that the audit of non-profit organizations differs from the audit of for-profit companies as they often have differences in culture, organizational structure, financial requirements, accounting standards, financial reporting, financial statements and the auditor's risk environment. While the audit is different, it should also be noted that in the vast majority of non-profit organizations, there are no statutory requirements for audit, but despite this, 99% of all non-profit organizations have some form of audit regulated by their statute (Lunde?n & Lindblad, 2011).

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.

The purpose of this thesis is to create a deeper and also a better understanding about how each of the professional secrecy and obligation to report are perceived from auditors and further investigate how the potential conflicts based on independence and ?can be suspect? are handled by the auditors. The purpose has been achieved through interviews with four different accounting firms.The interviews were conducted with Grant Thornton, BDO Mälardalen AB, PwC and KPMG to answer the research questions. Subsequently, a hermeneutic approach was used to since the interpretation of the interviews was considered as important to obtain knowledge of the respondent?s perception about the topic.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to seek understanding, describe and analyse how auditors practically reassure and maintain their independence towards clients.Methodology: The study is conducted with a qualitative method with a deductive approach. The study is based on interviews with both experienced and recently graduated auditors.Conclusion: Our empirical results show that there are economical incentives that contradict the requirements to fulfil the auditor?s independence. The conclusion is that the media view is narrow and biased. Furthermore the auditors agree that an acceptable level of comfort is achieved by offering a high value, being a part of a large network of professionals and the ability to set materiality and evaluate risks. .

Auditing demands knowledge in many diverse areas. To be able to provide all this knowledge it is necessary for the auditor to have access to persons with special skills. Through these contacts the auditor builds up a business network that brings support in the daily work. Our purpose with this study is to find out how auditor?s network in big auditing firms is organized and to show how they use their network.

The purpose of our essay is to examine if variation exists in the way that auditors try their independence, this so called analysis-model. We will suggest some factors that influence the way auditors practise the analysis-model. The institutional theory predicts no differencies since the normative pressure could be expected to be severe. But we found that among other things people?s qualifications, personalities and audit firm?s size and age influence the way auditors try their independence.