The Perceptions on IIA’s Standards and Internal Audit Quality: Evidence from Albania Banking Industry

Abstract

This paper aims to demonstrate and evaluate perceptions of internal auditors towards the Institute of Internal Auditors’ (IIA) standards, and to indicate the relationship between perceived standards that influence the quality of internal audit in Albania’s banking industry. In order to achieve these objectives, a questionnaire was prepared and distributed to internal auditors actively working in the banking industry. The statements of questionnaire were based on the IIA’s standards. The use of these standards is essential for industry because they are recommended by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision for providing a strong internal audit function within the banking organizations. It is concluded that the internal auditors comply with the principles defined in the standards, considering these principles necessary for the quality of the internal audit. This research presents very positive internal auditors’ perceptions on the attribute standards and performance standards respectively (4.42) and (4.41), besides, there are moderate positive relations between perceptions of performance and attribute standards and internal audit quality. Lastly, to explore whether there are any significant differences or not between the demographic components; gender, experience and perceptions of the attribute and performance standards, Independent t-test and ANOVA have been applied. According to results of the t-tests (used for gender) and ANOVA (used for work experience) there are not any perception differences on the attribute and performance standards by gender and work experience of the respondents. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n1p147