Thanks to Sarbanes-Oxley and emerging best practice, there is now more uniformity in the way audit, audit-related and non-audit fees are reported. This, our tenth audit fees survey, is published three months earlier than normal. Our audit fees data comes courtesy of Manifest, the independent proxy governance and research support organisation.
As a result, the classification system we use this year breaks with that of our recent surveys, but better reflects the emerging consensus. Here's some highlights:
- FTSE-100 audit fees are up 14% to £3.7m on average; FTSE-250 audits now cost £692,000, up 5%.
- BDO is now the only non-Big Four firm to have audit clients in the FTSE-250. Brit Insurance dropped Mazars for E&Y, Group4-Securicor switched from Baker Tilly to KPMG, while iSoft dropped RSM Robson Rhodes – and right out of the FTSE- 250, too. BDO won Countrywide from KPMG, which also lost easyJet and Rathbone Brothers to PwC; Resolution went to E&Y.
- Not one FTSE-100 company changed auditors in the past year, apart from Royal Dutch Shell which dropped KPMG as its joint auditor.
- Overall, fees other than statutory audit are virtually unchanged in the FTSE-100 and down 2% in the FTSE-250.
- Audit sign-off times have slowed again, taking a day longer than last year, two days more than in 2004.
Click here to download the 2006 audit fees survey.
For previous audit fees surveys, click on the relevent links below.
Manifest provides investors, advisers and quoted companies with
governance information and workflow tools. Independent and impartial, it has a
comprehensive governance and compensation database for UK and US equities.
www.manifest.co.uk
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