Tuesday, May 06, 2008 RP auditors competent globally: P&A
A PARTNER of an accounting and business advisory firm believes Filipino internal auditors are globally competent.
“We are training auditors in (other) Asian countries,” Juan Carlos Robles of Punongbayan and Araullo (P&A) told Sun.Star Cebu in an interview yesterday.
He added that Filipino auditors are also skilled to handle international audit standards. Aside from this, services of Filipino auditing firms are also engaged by foreign companies abroad.
As an example, P&A has clients from Hong Kong and Russia, where it handles international mandates on financial reporting like the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002.
In contention
“Globally, we are much in competition (with auditors from other countries),” he said.
Robles also said that since three years ago, Filipino internal auditors have been “highly profiled.”
With this, Robles also said the industry is not losing manpower with the emergence of the business process outsourcing and the information and communications technology sectors.
Just recently, eight auditors from P&A passed—two of them topped—the certification exams for internal auditors earning the Certified Internal Auditor (CIA) designation.
They are Hajji Pamplina, Grace San Pedro, Angel Francisco, Mary Jane Rafol, Gold Sinfuego, Pam Manzano, Eugene Hopilos and audit partner Robles.
Manny Tapucol and Debbie Bautista, P&A auditors, are now certified information systems auditors (CISA) after passing the information systems audit certification exams.
Business Risk Services (BRS) group head Lily Linsangan and manager Wowie Tee also earned the designation of Certified Fraud Examiners (CFE).
According to the Institute of Internal Auditors website, the CIA is “the only globally accepted certification for internal auditors.”
In the country, there are not a lot of CIAs, but Robles said there are a lot of people who are qualified to take the exam.
What is required is just a certain number of accounting subjects, Robles said.
He also clarified that passing the exam for public accountant certification is not a prerequisite to taking the CIA exam. (DME)
