Abstract

John Dramani Mills

Auditing has become a critical indispensable part of business and corporate life in today’s world and it is receiving great entrenchment in national legal status of almost every nation. However, there are evidences that suggest that users of financial statements and the public at large do not have knowledge about auditors’ responsibilities and this has resulted in what has become known as audit expectation gap. This study sought to investigate the level of knowledge of final year MBA (Accounting) students on auditors’ responsibilities and what auditors do vis-a-vis the companies’ code, International Standards on Auditing as well as the professional guidelines on auditing in one of the public universities in Kumasi, the capital town of Ashanti Region of Ghana. The study used structured self-administered questionnaire to gather information from the final year MBA (Accounting) students. The data collected were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics with the help of MS Excel package. The study revealed that the mean knowledge of the students’ on auditors’ responsibilities was 4.25 suggesting that only 25% of the final year MBA (Accounting) students know for sure what auditors’ responsibilities are. The study therefore recommended that policy makers, the university education administrators and regulators such as National Accreditation Board of Ghana together with the faculties take a closer look at Teaching and Learning of Accountancy and business Studies especially Auditing in Higher Education. It was further suggested that the universities review their syllabi on auditing courses to include the responsibilities, duties and roles of auditors, so as to examine these sections regularly to encourage students to read and understand it properly. Finally, the study proposed further research to cover most of the public universities in Ghana in the near future.