An Auditor Scheduling Approach in a Competitive CPA Environment

Abstract

ABSTRACT During the past decade, rapid economic development and extensive international trade in the Asia Pacific have significantly shifted business practices in the region. Multinational investments have fostered a high demand for CPA firms in this area, making the CPA environment more competitive than ever before. This shift in operating environments has made professionals more cost- and client-sensitive. To address these concerns, this study extends the work of Chan and Dodin by proposing an audit scheduling approach which can assist the CPA firm management to better retain their audit staff and enhance audit quality and thus to increase client satisfaction. By using a systematic and easy-to-use auditor scheduling approach, it helps the CPA firm not only in handling the complexity of audit operation but also in reducing audit-related operational costs. In addition, this study explicitly considers auditor preferences and the audit team's hierarchical structure. These features make the scheduling approach more realistic, thus making the model more practical to adopt.