SHE HAD RECENTLY STARTED her job
with a national CPA firm, and she was already confronted with a problem that could affect
her future with the firm. On an audit, she encountered a client who had been treating payments
to a large number, but by no means a majority, of its workers as payments to independent
contractors. This practice saves the client the payroll taxes that would otherwise
be due on the payments if the workers were classified as employees. In Sue’s judgment
this was improper as well as illegal and should have been noted in the audit. She raised the
issue with John, the senior accountant to whom she reported. He thought it was a possible
problem but did not seem willing to do anything about it. He encouraged her to talk to the partner
in charge if she didn’t feel satisfied.
She thought about the problem for a considerable time before approaching the partner in
charge. The ongoing professional education classes she had received from her employer emphasized
the ethical responsibilities that she had as a CPA and the fact that her firm endorsed
adherence to high ethical standards. This finally swayed her to pursue the issue with the partner
in charge of the audit. The visit was most unsatisfactory. Paul, the partner, virtually confirmed
her initial reaction that the practice was wrong, but he said that many other companies
in the industry follow such a practice. He went on to say that if an issue was made of it, Sue
would lose the account, and he was not about to take such action. She came away from the
meeting with the distinct feeling that had she chosen to pursue the issue, she would have created
an enemy.
Sue still felt disturbed and decided to discuss the problem with some of her co-workers.
She approached Bill and Mike, both of whom had been working for the firm for a couple of
years. They were familiar with the problem because they had encountered the same issue when
doing the audit the previous year. They expressed considerable concern that if she went over
the head of the partner in charge of the audit, they could be in big trouble since they had failed
to question the practice during the previous audit. They said that they realized it was probably
wrong, but they went ahead because it had been ignored in previous years, and they knew their
supervisor wanted them to ignore it again this year. They didn’t want to cause problems. They
encouraged Sue to be a “team player” and drop the issue.