logo

APES 110 Code of Ethics for Professional Assignment

   

Added on  2020-04-07

6 Pages2134 Words157 Views
Running Head: Role of Ethics in Accountancy ProfessionAPES 110: Code ofEthics for ProfessionalAccountants

Role of Ethics in Accountancy Profession 1Role of Ethics and Standards in Generating the Trust of General Public in Accountancy ProfessionAPES 110 Code of Ethics for Professional Accountant is issued by the Accounting Professional & Ethical Standards Board Limited and is in effect from 1st July 2011. These codes and standards of ethics are issued to be followed by the professional accountants of Australia whether they are performing their professional services in Australia or outside the country. Code of ethics are the well-established standards of what is considered as ethically right or wrong in terms of obligations, benefits of the general public, truth and fairness etc. Accounting profession ethics is the application of moral principles in the accounting and auditing practices so as to act in the interest of all the stakeholders. The codes are to be followed in true sense by the accounting practitioners to avoid thedisciplinary actions against them. The ethical compliance by the company is the key to gain the trust and confidence of the public.The distinguishing feature of the profession of accounting is that the accounting professionals has the statutory duty to act in public interest. In order to act in general public interest the members of accounting profession have to strictly adhere to the APES 110 code. Accounting information is the organised arrangement of the raw accounting data relating to the business operations of the company presented in the financial terms (George, Jones & Harvey, 2014). The work of accountant the auditors has an important role for any organisation as the shareholders potential investors and the other stakeholders of the company put reliance on the financial reports of the company to a great extent to take informed decisions about the investments made or to be made in the concernedcompany (Duska, Duska & Ragatz, 2011). Therefore, the accounting and auditing professionals are required to maintain a higher level transparency while performing financial reporting functions. Accountants are the one who prepare and present the financial statements of the company and auditors are the professionals who provide their opinion on the true and fair view of financial statements (Kaidonis, 2008) (Rossouw et al., 2010).APES 110 deals with the code of ethics accounting professionals are required to follow and the guidance there upon. All the professional accountants are mandatorily required to follow APES 110 while they are engaged in providing professional services (Accounting Professional and Ethical Standards Board (APESB), 2013). As the members while providing the services are required to satisfy the clients, at the same time they must also keep in mind their statutory obligations towards their profession. The codes of ethics prescribed under APES 110 requires a member from accountancy profession to follow the fundamental principles so as to act in public interest and to generate a greater degree of trust among them. These principle are explained in details as below:

Role of Ethics in Accountancy Profession 2Integrity: They must maintain the transparency and remain honest in all their professional relationships. The members should be fair enough while dealing with the external parties such as their clients and employers. The professionals must not be associated with any reports, returns and other forms of communication between company and the outsiders which they believe to be false ormisleading. Rather, they must try to communicate the matter of concern with those charged with the governance to make the corrections in the statements so as to avoid the falsification of reports. If the management or those charge with governance are not willing to make the required changes the professional accountants must make necessary actions to disassociate their name from the reports.Objectivity: The members must not allow the undue influence from any part of management to impact their professional obligations. They must remain unbiased whenever providing the professional services. The professional accountants must not, under any condition, compromise their professional judgements with the company’s judgements (Fan, Woodbine & Cheng, 2013). As their work can be relied upon only when there is an element of independence present in their services, they must not let their personal relationships with the management impair their independence and objectivity.Professional Competence: The professionals are supposed to apply the requisite amount of their knowledge, skills and due care while performing their duties. The code of ethics requires the professional accountants to be highly qualified and to possess the required degrees and certifications of the specified institutions. They must make possible efforts to ensure that the clients are given the competent services (Trung, 2015). Also, they must ensure that the professional services they are providing are not breaching the trust of the public in general.Confidentiality: The professional accountants must not disclose the confidential information in publicwhich is acquired by them during the course of provisioning of services until or unless disclosure of such information is in public interest or it is requirement of laws and regulations. While appointing the professional accountants the company expects them to respect the principle of confidentiality tothe full extent so that the sensitive information which may affect the company’s performance adversely is not revealed outside. However, when there is any requirement under any regulations to disclose certain matters which are of public interest the member must disclose them so that they could take informed decisions.Professionalism in behaviour: The members of the accountancy profession must not bring disrepute to their profession while engaged in provisioning of professional services and must abide the rules

End of preview

Want to access all the pages? Upload your documents or become a member.

Related Documents
Accounting Professional & Ethical Standards Doc
|8
|2007
|367

Financial Interpretation: Ethical Obligations and Liabilities of a Director
|8
|1716
|291

APES 110 Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants Doc
|7
|1945
|153

Conflict of Interest Case Studies
|5
|814
|30

Acc300 Auditing and Assurance Assignment - Doc
|8
|1976
|210

APES 110: Contribution towards Trust Building in Accounting Profession
|4
|1655
|326