회계법인의 비감사서비스 제공이 감사환경에 미치는 영향 : 감사고객수, 감사보수 및 감사시간을 중심으로

Abstract

In the past ten years, many accounting firms have concentrated on nonaudit services instead of audit and tax services, which are the traditional areas of focus for revenue growth in the accounting field. According to a press release by the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), sales of nonaudit services for the 2012 fiscal year for all 127 accounting firms registered with the FSS accounted for 38.5 percent of total sales, which is the highest percentage of all services offered. The growth of sales of nonaudit services over the previous year was also large (14 percent). Thus, it may not be an exaggeration to state that nonaudit services are leading the revenue growth of accounting firms. In Korea, audit fees have scarcely increased since the early 2000s despite increases in the size of client firms. When firms increase in size, in general, audit effort and audit fees must also be increased (Kwon and Ki 2011; Kwak and Park 2010; Kwon and Kim 2001). However, this is not the case in Korea. Therefore, as the profitability of audit services continues to deteriorate, accounting firms are shifting their focus to nonaudit services, which typically have high margins, as alternative ways to improve profitability. However, provision of profitable nonaudit services is limited by regulations for many firms. As the deficit resulting from provision of audit services continues to increase, some auditors may choose to reduce audit effort in order to increase profitability, thereby compromising audit quality for client firms. However, if the provision of nonaudit services improves the profitability of accounting firms, the audit environment (including audit effort) may also improve; thus, provision of nonaudit services may ultimately have a positive effect on audit quality for all clients of accounting firms. Prior research has only focused on the effects on audit quality of the provision of nonaudit services for audit client. Iin this paper, we investigate whether the proportion of sales of nonaudit services affects the audit environment. In particular, we focus on audit effort, attempting to reflect the practical working environment of auditors. Audit effort, among the many components of the audit environment, is measured by determining the number of audit hours. To allow sufficient audit time to maintain audit quality, an auditor’s total workload should not be too heavy, and audit fees should be set at a level to enable auditors to spend sufficient time to achieve high quality. Therefore, first, we examine whether the proportion of sales of nonaudit services affects the total number of audit clients using audit firms as our unit of observation in order to verify an auditor's total workload, which is a factor crucial to the audit environment. Second, we examine the effects of the proportion of sales of nonaudit services on audit hours and audit fees. We use data from a sample of accounting firms that submitted business reports to the FSS from 2005 to 2010 and the manufacturing companies that were audited by these accounting firms and were listed on the KOSPI and KOSDAQ stock markets. The results of our empirical tests show that there is a negative relation between the proportion of nonaudit services and the total number of audit clients, indicating that a larger proportion of nonaudit services is associated with a smaller number of audit clients. We also find a positive relation between the proportion of nonaudit services and audit hours/fees; that is, as the proportion of nonaudit services increases, audit hours and fees for each client increase. This result can be interpreted as follows: accounting firms that provide more nonaudit services tend to make fewer bids for audit engagements and to charge higher audit fees to their clients. For these firms, the motive for suggesting audit engagements for lower fees may be decreased. Also, as the total number of audit clients decreases, auditors may devote more audit hours to each audit client. We believe these empirical results have implications for the provision of nonaudit services by accounting firms. First, we provide new insight for financial supervisory authorities attempting to strengthen restrictions on the provision of nonaudit services by accounting firms who are concerned that the growth in the provision of nonaudit services will impair the independence of audit firms. However, no consensus has emerged concerning the association between the provision of nonaudit services and auditor independence. Therefore, if the provision of nonaudit services contributes to the improvement of audit quality for all audit clients, this positive effect should also be considered in policy-making regarding restrictions on the provision of nonaudit services. Second, our results suggest that it is necessary to shift the focus from audit clients to accounting firms when discussing the effects of the provision of nonaudit services, as these services have led to growth of accounting firms in Korea in the last ten years. Considering that audit environments can be improved only if accounting firms continue to grow, the provision of nonaudit services may be a practical avenue for sustainable growth to make up for lack of profitability due to low audit fees.