Since 2002, after the Sarbanes-Oxley Act being enacted,
it brought a huge influence to public accounting firms.
Because of the severe provisions and higher punishment of
Act, accounting firms have to not only complete audit task
more carefully and play a more crucial role to supervise the
companies’ internal control. Audit firms’ operating process
has undergone many changes correspondingly, such as audit
firms must keep all audit work documents for at least seven
years and experience annual inspection by PCAOB.
The growth of workload also makes the cost of accounting
firm increase a lot thus increase the accounting firms’ audit
fee in the post-SOX period. Of all the auditing firms, because
Big 4 has most complex work and highest risk, Big 4 audit
fee increased more than other small audit firms. But, when
audit fee increases, the non-audit fee reduced year by year
conversely because nine-category non-audit service has been
prohibited under SOX Act. But overall, the total costs
(include audit and non-audit fee) present a growing trend.
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Because the promulgation of SOX is too hasty, some
contradictory and imperfect provisions cause controversy
among public and most companies. One of the most
controversial problems is that the new regulation made public
companies spend much more on its auditing and internal
control, and these operating costs even exceed the benefits
acquired from the new provisions. This phenomenon also put
much pressure on numerous companies. Therefore, how to
balance the costs and benefits has risen to a new issue for
company management in the post-SOX era.