Rotation and cost considerations.
Whenever rotation is suggested, auditors often note the problems with increasing the cost of the audit due to lack of familiarity with the client’s business.
It is difficult to accept this argument as sufficient justification to reject mandatory rotation.
If increased costs resulted, then it is more likely to be from a voluntary increase in the amount of audit work performed and the quality of the auditors hired to do the work.
These two changes would address the two most common areas of audit deficiencies noted by the SEC in enforcement actions (Beasley etal. 2001).
Moreover, any increase in the cost of doing the audit would be passed on to the shareholders, and I suspect they would gladly pay for it knowing they were actually getting an independent
opinion on management’s financial statements.