Tentative length: 1500 - 2000 words

Underlying aim

The assignment task aims at assisting students to learn and develop the following key skills:

• Research
• Critical thinking
• Writing professional level business report
• Communication

Students will learn and develop these skills by analysing the case company from the point of accounting in general and planning and designing audit approach in particular. Your assignment work must meet basic academic and professional standards which include articulate, critical, supported by evidence, free from errors and more importantly free from plagiarism (i.e. your own work).

This assessment item assesses the following learning outcomes as identified in the Course Profile for ACCT20040:

• Evaluate critically significant auditing standards and ethical questions
• Describe final verification audit testing of financial reports
• Evaluate the appropriateness of and then prepare different types of audit reports

Assignment case background

You have recently joined the Accountancy firm in Gold Coast, Queensland. On June 2014, Gold Coast Paradise Pty Ltd, a family owned local company involved in catering holiday and leisure activities, has approached your Accountancy firm to carry out the audit for financial year ending 31 December 2014.

Gold Coast Paradise offers holiday and leisure activities for visitors through its number of business outlets. In addition to the five star hotel, its other operations include boating, surfing and diving activities. Rod and Gina Wood are majority shareholders of Wood Group which controls Gold Coast Paradise. Gina is the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Gold Coast Paradise as well as director of both companies and Rod is the chairman of the board of directors of both Gold Coast Paradise and Wood Group. As an unlisted company, Gold Coast Paradise was not required under the Corporation Act 2001 to get its financial reports audited in the past. However, a new private equity investor group, Civic Venture, has just acquired 30 percent share of Gold Coast Paradise. The Civic Venture and the bank which has provided Civic Venture part of funds have requested an audit of the company's 2014 financial reports.

Gold Coast Paradise employs full-time staff, part-time staff and casual staff. While part-time and casual staff are used during peak periods, the business also employs 35 full-time staff in administration, accounting, catering, cleaning and hotel/ restaurant duties. Rod and Gina have a fairly relaxed management style. They trust their employees to work hard for the company and reward them well in return. The accounts staff, in particular, are very loyal to the company. Rod told the audit partner that some accounts staff enjoy their job so much that they have never taken any annual leave, and hardly any employee ever take sick leave.

The accounts department currently consists of three employees. Senior accounts manager, Josh Dunn, reports directly to the CFO, Gina Wood. Josh has started her transition to retirement and hopes to fully retire within three years. He delegates most of the work to two accounts staff, John and Katherine. Josh claims that he has to do this because he is very busy developing a policy and procedures manual for the accounting department. This delegated work includes opening mail, processing payments and receipts, banking funds received, performing reconciliations, posting journals and performing the payroll function. Katherine is a recent CPA graduate. John is part-time and work only three days a week. He is responsible for posting all journal entries into the accounting system and the payroll function. Katherine does the balance of the work, but they often help each other out in busy periods.

Queensland Environment Ministry recently investigated the effects of global warming on the Great Barrier Reef. Its report reveals that climate change is likely to cause increasing damage to the coral reefs and may bring a devastating tropical storms over the next 10 years.

Assignment task

The audit partner asks you to commission the report. Your report should be critical but at the same time presented in easy-to-read and understand format. The report should address the followings in critical and considered manner:

• Examine the background information in relation to the types of risk that you would consider when determining preliminary materiality for the 2014 audit of Gold Coast Paradise.
• Identify the factors that would impact on the risk of material misstatement and explain the effect of those factors on planning materiality and risk for the 2014 audit of Gold Coast Paradise.

Format and presentation of the report

Format

• Cover page showing the title of the report, the author (Student name and ID number) and the word count (not included in the word count)
• Executive summary outlining the major findings of the report (1/2 to 1 page) (not included in the word count)
• Table of contents (not included in the word count)
• An introduction telling the reader what the report will cover and how it is structured
• The report itself (This is key part of the report)
• A conclusion/recommendation
• References - using Harvard referencing style (not included in the word count)
• appendices (if applicable – not included in the word count)