Once you have become an ICAEW member and hold the AQ and a practising certificate, you can be nominated forresponsible individual (RI) status by a firm of registered auditors to gain audit signing rights.
The Financial Reporting Council (FRC) has signed a memorandum of understanding on reciprocal arrangements (MOURA) with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) which provides two routes to the AQ for CA ANZ members in Australia:
- The aptitude test route for CA ANZ members who currently hold Registered Company Auditor status in Australia.
- The experience route for CA ANZ members who do not hold Registered Company Auditor status in Australia but have passed the appropriate Australian variant exams.
Experience route
Applicants are required to complete 24 months of supervised audit experience at an ICAEW Authorised Training Employer (ATE) in the UK.
You can only cite experience gained after 26 March 2024 as this is the date the FRC signed the agreement with ASIC.
During the 24 months of supervised experience, applicants must complete a minimum of 240 days of appropriate audit experience. Of the 240 days' audit work experience:
- at least 120 days must be in statutory audit work as defined in the Companies Act 2006, and;
- the rest must be in either statutory audit work or other audit work similar to statutory audit work, where the nature of such work conforms to the definitions agreed by ICAEW and the FRC.
Please note that, unlike the standard definition of statutory audit work, experience obtained in the Republic of Ireland, Germany, Luxembourg, Cyprus, Netherlands, USA, Jersey, and Guernsey cannot count towards the 120 statutory audit days requirement. However, this experience can be cited as other audit work similar to statutory audit work.
You must evidence you have met the full experience requirements by completing the Evidence of Supervised Audit Experience Form and include sign offs from the appropriate individual at your ATE – the Qualified Person Responsible for Training (QPRT), Deputy QPRT, or the Person Responsible for Training (PRT).
Eligibility requirements
To be eligible to apply under the experience route, you must provide a letter from CA ANZ confirming that you:
- hold current membership of CA ANZ and the dates you have held membership (you must retain your CA ANZ membership throughout your whole registration as an RI with ICAEW);
- have gained membership of CA ANZ via the normal education and training route and not via any reciprocal membership pathway;
- have passed the Core 4: Taxation (Australian) examination or the equivalent under a previous syllabus;
- are in good standing with CA ANZ.
Application
Please apply for reciprocal membership first and ensure you have received confirmation of your ICAEW membership.
Please then submit a letter from CA ANZ confirming you have met the above eligibility criteria along with the completed Evidence of Supervised Audit Experience Form to aq@iceaw.com.
Once you have been awarded ICAEW membership and your audit experience has been verified by ICAEW, you will be awarded the Audit Qualification (AQ).
Responsible Individual status
In addition to holding ICAEW membership and the AQ, you will also need to hold an ICAEW practising certificate before applying for responsible individual status (RI). You can do this when completing your reciprocal membership application and you can also cite your membership time with CA ANZ towards the 2-year membership requirement for a practising certificate.
Once you hold ICAEW membership, the AQ, and an ICAEW practising certificate, you can apply for audit signing rights as an RI. This will involve evidencing your audit experience and CPD over the past 24 months.
Please note that you will also need to maintain your CA ANZ membership throughout the whole period you are registered as an RI and you will need to declare this during the RI application process.