The Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) has published a report outlining the outcomes of its 2025 review of the Audit Quality Indicators (AQI) Disclosure Framework and the corresponding enhancements to the Framework.<\/p>\n
Audit Quality Indicators (AQIs) are quantitative and qualitative metrics designed to reflect key aspects of an audit firm\u2019s System of Quality Management and engagement-specific audit processes. They are commonly used by audit committees, regulators and audit firms to assess factors that influence audit quality, identify trends, and highlight potential risk areas within audit engagements.<\/p>\n
The review was conducted in response to developments in the auditing profession and increasing stakeholder expectations. ACRA\u2019s assessment included:<\/p>\n
analysis of findings from its study on the linkage between selected engagement-level AQIs and engagement review outcomes;<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
consideration of stakeholder feedback, including from audit committees and practitioners; and<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
a review of international practices and developments in audit quality measurement and disclosure.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Following the review, ACRA has enhanced the Framework as follows:<\/p>\n
Introduction of three new indicators:<\/p>\n
Use of technology \u2013 to reflect the growing role of audit tools, data analytics and automation in audit quality and execution;<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
Culture survey \u2013 to provide insight into firm-wide and engagement-level culture, including behaviours and attitudes that support audit quality; and<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
Restatements \u2013 to capture post-issuance financial statement corrections as an indicator of audit outcomes and potential quality issues.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n
Update to an existing indicator:<\/p>\n
Audit hours \u2013 revised to better address emerging risks, including how audit effort is planned, deployed and aligned with engagement complexity.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Enhanced data collection and systems
Audit firms may need to enhance internal systems to capture, validate and analyse new data points, particularly those relating to technology usage and culture surveys.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
Governance and oversight considerations
Audit committees should expect more granular and informative AQI disclosures, which may influence discussions on audit planning, resourcing, and quality risks.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
Consistency and comparability challenges
Firms will need to exercise judgement to ensure consistent interpretation and application of the new and revised indicators, especially where qualitative elements are involved.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n
Regulatory and inspection alignment
The expanded Framework may also have implications for how firms prepare for regulatory inspections, as AQIs increasingly inform risk-based supervisory approaches.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Audit firms should review the updated AQI Disclosure Framework and the published report in detail, assess readiness to implement the new and revised indicators, and engage early with audit committees on the expected changes in disclosures.<\/p>\n
Source:<\/strong> ACRA,15 January 2026<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) has published a report outlining the outcomes of its 2025 review of the Audit Quality Indicators (AQI) Disclosure Framework and the corresponding enhancements to the Framework. Background and purpose of AQIs Audit Quality Indicators (AQIs) are quantitative and qualitative metrics designed to reflect key aspects of an audit […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,13,8,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-accounting","category-auditing","category-incometax","category-techupdates"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2596"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2596\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2598,"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2596\/revisions\/2598"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ehluar.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}