The influence of client importance on the audit quality: A study to understand external auditor’s role as the guardians of strong and justice organizations (Goal 16 sustainable development goals)

Abstract

This study aims to see the effect of client importance on audit quality by comparing before and after the issuance of Indonesian government regulation member 20 of 2015, which states that there is no longer mandatory audit firm rotation for public accountant firm (KAP). By abolishing rotation obligation, the bonding between the client and public accountant firm will be stronger, therefore, the client’s importance will further reduce the quality of the audit. However, this study’s result does not find any difference in the effect of client importance on audit quality in the period before and after the elimination of the public accountant firm rotation obligation. These results indicate that Indonesia’s accountant public firms are still maintaining their integrity, possibly due to law enforcement and sanctions. Thus, auditors maintained their role as the agent of financial statements’ trust by providing a high-quality audit to promote accountable and transparent organizations.