Part (b) focussed on the issue of off-shoring audit work, which had been discussed in an article. This requirement was for five marks and the scenario described how some of the audit work in relation to Wire Co had been performed by an overseas office.

The work performed by the overseas office included numerical checks on calculations and reading the board minutes of Wire Co. Answers ranged in quality, with some good attempts which identified that while off-shoring can bring efficiencies to an audit, care must be taken in deciding the type of work that is performed by the overseas office.

From this scenario it should have been identified that off-shoring procedures such as the reading of board minutes to identify audit issues was not appropriate, but relatively few answers mentioned this point.

Weaker answers tended to suggest that overseas offices would be incompetent and unable to perform even the simplest of audit procedures. Some candidates misinterpreted the information provided and assumed that the scenario was about using component auditors in a group situation, which was not the case.