An analysis of the demands on a sufficient audit: Professional appearance is what counts!

The aim of this paper is to analyze the demands on a sufficient audit. Previous research has suggested that the production of comfort is not only about producing an audit according to ‘the manual’ but that professional aspects such as the appearance of the auditor also are of importance. In practice the relationship between, and the relative importance of, process and professional aspects of an audit are however unclear. In this paper this question is probed by analyzing the demands on a sufficient audit by an actor that in its jurisdiction is an obligatory point of passage for the framing of a sufficient audit: the Swedish supervisory board of public accountants (SSBPA). The material that is investigated is the disciplinary cases published by the SSBPA. The image of a sufficient audit that materializes from this investigation is of an audit that meets the demands of professional appearance.