What does the legislation say about mandatory audit for LLCs in 2017? What are the criteria? Are there any chances that a limited liability company is not subject to mandatory audit at all? This is discussed in our consultation.

There's always a chance

Such an organizational and legal structure as a limited liability company is today the most popular form of doing business in Russia. Usually it involves a very small authorized capital and staff. However, it also happens exactly the opposite: it can be a large company with good financial turnover. Of course, in both the first and second cases, you need to know about the criteria for the mandatory audit of an LLC in 2017.

It is important to clearly understand that the current legislation does not directly establish the criteria for mandatory audit for LLCs in 2017. Including the 2008 Law “On Auditing Activities” No. 307-FZ. However, it is categorically impossible to conclude from this that the current legislation does not establish a requirement to conduct a mandatory audit in an LLC.

Moreover: The fact that a limited liability company has the status of a small business representative by law does not in itself automatically exempt the company from undergoing a mandatory audit. For LLCs, criteria of this kind are not established by law.

What the law says

The 2008 Federal Law “On Auditing Activities” No. 307-FZ, which we mentioned, established a number of criteria from which one can understand whether an LLC is subject to mandatory audit. But very few of them fall under this organizational and legal structure of doing business.

According to Article 5 of this Federal Law, LLCs subject to mandatory audit in the year preceding the reporting year have:

Revenue from sales (products, goods, work, services) over 400 million rubles (excluding VAT);
The size of assets on the balance sheet at the end of the year exceeded 60 million rubles.

Sanctions

What will happen if you do not conduct a mandatory audit for an LLC when it is required by law (see above)?

The fact is that the current legal norms do not provide for sanctions as such for the very fact of failure to conduct a legally obligatory audit. However, they can be punished for the lack of an audit report. Basically, administrative sanctions are provided for this.

Thus, the liability of an LLC for failure to conduct a mandatory audit, or more precisely, the lack of an auditor’s conclusion on annual reporting, falls under:

Article 19.7 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation - when the audit report, along with a copy of the financial statements, was not submitted on time or was not submitted at all to the local branch of Rosstat;
Part 1 of Article 15.11 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation - for gross violation of the requirements for accounting (financial) reporting.

In recent years, the state has taken a course towards maximum openness and transparency of information about economic entities. Changes are being made in all areas. The auditing industry has not been left behind. The main goal of the amendments is to increase business transparency, reduce pressure on honest companies, and bring tax offenders out of the shadows to eliminate unfair competition.

Changes since 2017 in the field of mandatory audit of financial statements

1. Requirement for the preparation of audit reports in accordance with ISAs since 2017. What should we expect?

Our state strives for European indicators in terms of financial reporting. Therefore, another step towards increasing its publicity and transparency was the introduction of international auditing standards (ISA) in the Russian Federation on January 1, 2017 (Orders of the Ministry of Finance of Russia dated October 24, 2016 N 192n, dated November 9, 2016 No. 207n).

For audit companies this means the following changes:

increase in the number of audit procedures

increase in the volume of data required to analyze the activities of audited companies

new quality standards for mandatory audits

new standards of information in the auditor's report

introduction of a modified opinion in the conclusion

For audited companies this means:

PROS: improving the quality of business risk assessment; a conclusion that will contain not only an assessment of the company’s financial statements, but also pay attention to significant risks for the business, etc.; expanded report information for accounting and for external and internal interested users: shareholders, board of directors, etc.

MINUSES: increase in the cost of mandatory audit since 2017; increasing the deadline for providing an audit report; increase in the cost of bank loans for companies (due to an increase in the level of transparency of the company’s activities and reflection of all identified business risks in the audit report)

2. Information about taxes, fines, income and expenses, and headcount will appear on the Federal Tax Service website

Information about economic entities is becoming more open. From June 1, 2016, tax secrets are no longer (amendments to Article 102 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation were introduced by Federal Law No. 134-FZ dated May 1, 2016):

information on the average number of employees of the organization;
the amount of taxes and fees paid by the organization, with the exception of taxes paid when importing goods into the EAEU and by tax agents;
amounts of income and expenses according to financial statements.

On July 1, 2017, the publication of this information in the public domain on the official website of the Federal Tax Service on the Internet began.

In addition, information on the amounts of arrears, arrears of penalties and fines, applied special regimes and the participation of taxpayers in consolidated groups will be published on the Federal Tax Service website.

Thanks to the appearance of additional information about legal entities in the public domain, taxpayers have an additional opportunity to assess the risks when choosing a counterparty, and there will also be an additional argument to prove to the Federal Tax Service in the event of claims that due diligence was exercised when concluding a transaction.

3. Information about the mandatory audit is posted on the Federal Resources website

From October 1, 2016 in Russia, the results of the mandatory audit of accounting (financial) statements become public. Corresponding amendments were made to the Federal Law “On Auditing Activities”. Organizations subject to mandatory audit must now enter information about the audit results into the Unified Federal Register of Information on the Facts of Activities of Legal Entities (hereinafter referred to as the EFRS http://www.fedresurs.ru/) within 3 business days after receiving the audit report. Such information includes:

name, INN, OGRN, SNILS of the audited entity;
name (full name), INN, OGRN (OGRNIP), SNILS of the auditing organization (individual auditor);
a list of accounting (financial) statements that were audited;
the period of preparation of the accounting (financial) statements in respect of which the audit was carried out;
date of the auditor's report;
the opinion of the auditing organization (individual auditor) on the reliability of the accounting (financial) statements of the audited entity, indicating the circumstances that have or may have a significant impact on the reliability of such statements.

Violation by an official of the audited organization of the obligation to disclose such information may entail an administrative fine provided for in parts 6-8 of Article 14.25 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation, up to 50 thousand rubles or disqualification for a period of one to three years.

4. From 2018, audit confidentiality will likely be abolished

The corresponding Draft Law No. 96436-7 on amendments to Articles 82 and 93.1 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation has already been submitted to the State Duma.

Let us remind you that, according to the current version of Article 82 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation, when exercising tax control, the collection, storage, use and dissemination of information about a taxpayer obtained in violation of the requirement to ensure the confidentiality of information constituting the professional secret of other persons, in particular attorney-client secret, audit secret, is not allowed.

However, from January 1, 2018, it is proposed to exclude audit secrecy from this article. In addition, it is proposed to establish the right of officials of the Federal Tax Service to request from auditors documents (information) received by them about the taxpayer during audit activities and in the provision of other audit-related services. The requested documents must be related to the calculation and payment (withholding, transfer) of tax (fee) and can be requested from auditors if the taxpayer has not submitted them to the Federal Tax Service on his own.

So, the area of accounting and reporting, as well as tax obligations of companies, is becoming more transparent.

So that by March 2018, when closing the 2017 financial year and submitting annual financial statements, you do not end up with an auditor’s report, containing numerous reservations, We advise companies:

Conduct an audit in 2 stages (stage 1 - based on the results of the 9th month of 2017 in October-December 2017, stage 2 - based on the results of 2017 in the first quarter of 2018).

In this case, the auditors will complete almost the entire amount of work before the end of the reporting year, which will allow the organization to take into account their conclusions and recommendations in order to approach the annual report without distortions and errors in accounting. In this case, the organization will be able to eliminate haste and errors in reports and reduce the burden on accounting at the end of the year.

It is no secret that accounting and preparation of tax returns are the sphere of activity of the chief accountant. However, managers and founders should remember that responsibility for the accountant’s mistakes extends to them too.

As is known, if there are significant accounting distortions, the audit report may be negative, which will require the organization to additional costs associated with correcting the identified violations. For a re-audit of the revised financial statements, this means an additional payment for the auditors’ time for verification and the time period for issuing an opinion will also increase. For the audit of the revised financial statements, you will need to make an additional payment, since the volume of the auditor’s work increases, and accordingly, the deadlines too.

Carrying out the bulk of the work based on the results of reporting for 9 months will help both the accounting department and the auditors to avoid these troubles. And even after receiving a report with a list of significant errors made when preparing reports for 9 months, the organization will have time to make the necessary corrections in accounting and receive a positive audit report at the end of the year

If auditors first come to the company in February-March, the accounting department has too little time to make changes. At the same time, accountants prepare the annual report and experience double workload, which does not have the best effect on the results.

- Break down the audit by year.

When conducting an audit in two stages, its cost will be evenly distributed over 2017-2018 and will not require a one-time diversion of funds from the company’s economic activities in 2018.

- Do not treat the audit as a formal procedure only for submitting financial statements. The formal approach and formal attitude towards auditing have sunk into oblivion. Today, this is not acceptable both on the part of the audited entities and on the part of the auditors.

Why deprive yourself of the opportunity to receive quality feedback on the state of affairs of the company? The organization's accountants will correct identified inconsistencies in a timely manner, and will not spend a lot of time and effort on this, as they would have spent correcting documents retroactively.

If errors are discovered only at the beginning of the next year, the accounting department spends time clarifying the declarations, and the company spends money on additional payment of arrears and penalties.

Let us remind you that from October 1, 2017, the rules for calculating penalties for organizations will change. The innovations concern the arrears that will arise from October 1, 2017 . If the delay exceeds 30 calendar days, penalties will be calculated as follows:

based on 1/300 of the refinancing rate of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, valid in the period from the 1st to the 30th calendar days (inclusive) of such delay;
based on 1/150 of the refinancing rate of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, relevant for the period starting from the 31st calendar day of delay, which is proportional to the interest paid on bank loans.

- Take the choice of an audit company seriously.

The market is saturated with many offers, both from individuals and from various companies. Our company “FIN-AUDIT” has been on the audit services market for the 17th year.

Business reputation and work quality standards are impeccable. We are always ready for a constructive dialogue with audited entities on issues that arise during the audit.

Do not forget that for the absence of an audit report or failure to enter the relevant information into the Unified Federal Reserve System, you can receive a large fine.

The audit of financial (accounting) statements for 2017 is required to be carried out by:

legal entities whose revenue in 2016 exceeded 400 million rubles.
or balance sheet assets at the end of the year exceed 60 million rubles.
developers within the framework of Federal Law 214-FZ
companies preparing consolidated financial statements
joint stock companies, including non-public ones.
public offering companies
banks, insurance companies and some other categories in cases established by laws No. 307-FZ “On Auditing Activities”, 208 Federal Law “On Consolidated Reporting”.

Let us recall that according to Federal Law No. 402-FZ, the company must provide an audit report to the territorial division of Rosstat either simultaneously with the submission of financial statements, or no later than 10 business days from the day following the date of the audit report, but no later than December 31 of the year following reporting.

A company that falls under the mandatory audit criteria cannot choose whether or not to submit an audit report to the statistical authorities. You will definitely have to give it up.

We wish YOU successful completion of the 2017 audit. Our company “FIN-AUDIT”, in turn, is ready to provide a high-quality approach when carrying out audit procedures and preparing an audit report.

When should an organization conduct a mandatory audit for 2017?

Mandatory audit for 2017. In what cases is an organization required to conduct an audit? Submission of the audit report to Rosstat and the tax inspectorate.

Question: When should an organization conduct a mandatory audit for 2017? When must an organization submit its audit report for 2017 to statistics?

Answer: The audit for 2017 is carried out after the end of the financial year until December 31, 2018.

The law establishes 2 options for the period when the auditor’s report on the reliability of the financial statements must be received by Rosstat (Part 2 of Article 18 of the Law “On Accounting” No. 402-FZ):

Together with annual accounting - within the general period.

If the auditors’ verdict is not yet ready, then the law gives 10 working days from the date of their conclusion, but no later than December 31 of the year following the reporting year.

In what cases is an organization required to conduct an audit?

Submission of the audit report to Rosstat and the tax inspectorate

When to submit an audit report to Rosstat

If an organization is required to conduct an audit, then it must submit an audit report along with financial statements to the territorial division of Rosstat. You need to do this:

or simultaneously with the submission of financial statements;

or separately no later than 10 working days from the day following the date of the auditor's report, in any case no later than December 31 of the year following the reporting year.

Responsibility for evading mandatory audit

What is the liability for evading a mandatory audit?

If an organization has not conducted a mandatory audit and does not have an audit report, this is a gross violation of accounting and reporting requirements. Fines are provided for in the Code of the Russian Federation on Administrative Offences. The amount of the fine for officials is from 5,000 to 10,000 rubles. And in case of repeated violation - up to 20,000 rubles. or disqualification from one to two years.

If you didn’t publish the JSC’s financial statements and auditor’s report, and didn’t present the audit report to the shareholders, you will be fined in accordance with Part 1 of Article 15.19 and Part 2 of Article 15.23.1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation. The amount of the fine will be:
– for organizations – from 500,000 to 700,000 rubles;
– for officials – from 20,000 to 30,000 rubles. or disqualification for up to one year.

If you do not submit your audit report to Rosstat on time, you will receive a warning or a fine:
– for organizations – from 3000 to 5000 rubles;
– for an official (manager) – from 300 to 500 rubles.

Such sanctions are provided for in the Code of the Russian Federation on Administrative Offences.

Similar fines will apply if you are late in submitting your financial statements or submit them incompletely (letter of Rosstat dated February 16, 2016 No. 13-13-2/28-SMI).

Entering information into the state register

Is it necessary to enter the results of a mandatory audit into the Unified Federal Register of Information on the Facts of the Activities of Legal Entities?

The customer is obliged to enter information about the results of the mandatory audit into the Unified Federal Register of Information on the Facts of the Activities of Legal Entities. Namely:

data of the audited entity. TIN, OGRN, SNILS;

auditor data. Name (full name), INN, OGRN, SNILS;

a list of audited accounting (financial) statements and the period for which they were compiled;

date of the auditor's report, the auditor's opinion on the reliability of the reporting;

circumstances that have or may have an impact on the reliability of reporting. But only if it is not a state or commercial secret.

Accounting in an organization is an important system that allows owners and managers to quickly obtain data on the state of affairs at the enterprise. No one doubts that the data in this system must be correct and up to date. That is why an audit of financial statements is provided.

Mandatory audit

In cases established by law, such verification of financial statements is mandatory. A mandatory audit of an enterprise's financial statements is provided, for example, for open joint-stock companies, banks, stock exchanges, insurance companies, as well as for companies whose revenue for the previous reporting year amounted to more than 400 million rubles. or the amount of assets on the balance sheet as of the end of the year preceding the reporting year is more than 60 million rubles. These are the requirements of Art. 5 of Federal Law No. 307-FZ of December 30, 2008 “On Auditing Activities”. In other cases, verification of reporting is optional, but desirable. The main purpose of a reporting audit is to confirm its reliability.

Objectives of the audit of financial statements

In the process of auditing the financial statements of an enterprise, the auditor must solve the following tasks:

Assessing the correctness of the composition and content of the enterprise reporting forms themselves.
Assessment of compliance and interconnection of reporting indicators.
Assessing the correctness and compliance of the accounting and taxation methods used in the organization with current legislation.
Assessing the correctness of the formation of consolidated reporting.

As a rule, to perform these tasks, the auditor will need a balance sheet, a profit and loss statement, a cash flow statement, a statement of changes in capital, an appendix to the balance sheet, a report on the intended use of funds received, and an explanatory note. The auditor will also request balance sheets and the general ledger. As a result, the auditor must answer the question of whether the financial statements are reliable and whether the methodology for their preparation complies with legal requirements.

Main stages of financial statements audit

As part of an audit of financial statements, a specialist auditor goes through the following mandatory stages.

Preparatory or introductory stage of verification. At this stage, the auditor gets acquainted with the company and receives the most complete information about the company’s activities. At this stage of the audit, the auditor studies the regional and industry characteristics of the company, the degree of automation of accounting processes, the company’s financial obligations, and the internal control system.

Audit planning is the second stage of an accounting audit. This is a significant verification stage both in terms of time and the volume of work performed. It is at this stage that an inspection schedule is drawn up, inspection areas are specified in detail, a group of specialists participating in the inspection is formed, and the areas to be inspected are agreed upon with the company. This stage is described in detail in clause 9 of standard No. 3 “Audit Planning”, approved. Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation dated September 23, 2002 N 696. Based on the plan, an audit program is formed. In the future, as necessary, during the inspection itself, the plan and program can be revised.

The third stage is the actual audit itself. At this stage, the collection, assessment and analysis of facts relating to the company’s activities take place. The audit is carried out on the basis of federal and international standards. The following procedures are used in the process of auditing financial statements:

Well, at the fourth and final stage, the results of the audit of the enterprise’s financial statements are summed up and an audit report is drawn up, in which the auditor expresses his professional opinion on the reliability of the financial statements, calculating the level of materiality.

Mandatory audit in 2019. What has changed, where to submit the report?

Criteria for mandatory audit in 2019.

Sanctions for failure to submit an audit report in 2019.
When to enter into an audit agreement for 2019

For 2019, financial statements with an audit report will be submitted only to the tax authority, the criteria for mandatory audit will change, and the liability for not conducting a mandatory audit will increase.

What are the criteria for mandatory audit in 2019?

An audit in 2019 is a necessary check and one of the ways to confirm the company’s work in accordance with the law. Mandatory audits are carried out primarily to avoid conflicts with regulatory authorities, as well as to gain the trust of their clients and potential investors.

In what cases a mandatory audit is carried out for 2019 is enshrined in Federal Law No. 307-FZ “On Auditing Activities”, including:

Banks, insurance companies and certain other types of organizations are subject to audit in cases provided for by regulations:
Organizations preparing consolidated statements in accordance with Law 208-FZ “On Consolidated Reports”;
Companies offering securities publicly;
Groups of interrelated organizations, as a single economic entity that composes financial accounting statements;
The company is a joint stock company.
Mandatory verification may be established by federal laws. For example, for microfinance companies and developers, for organizers of gambling and issuers of securities.
The company's revenue for the previous reporting year was more than 400 million rubles;
The value of assets on the balance sheet at the end of the previous year exceeds 60 million rubles;

A mandatory check is carried out if at least one of the listed grounds is met.

Lawmakers plan to change audit criteria in 2019. The draft law has already been prepared for the second reading (No. 273179-7). There is reason to believe that from 2020 the audit criteria will change:

the amount of assets on the balance sheet will increase as of the end of each of the two consecutive years preceding the reporting year - up to 200 million rubles;
revenue will increase from 400 million rubles. The new criterion is for each of the two consecutive years preceding the reporting year up to 600 million rubles;
will introduce a new criterion for the number of employees - at least 100 people for each of the two consecutive years preceding the reporting year.

So far in 2019, the bill has not yet been adopted, and the old criteria of 2018 continue to apply. But next year, 2020, the changes may come into force and the audit will be carried out according to other criteria.

Sanctions for failure to provide audit reports in 2019.

If your company falls under the conditions for a mandatory audit, then no later than December 31, 2020, you need to submit an audit report on the 2019 financial statements to the tax authority. At the same time, the audit report must be submitted no later than 10 working days after the date of the audit report. (Clause 2 of Article 18 of the Law of December 6, 2011 No. 402-FZ “On Accounting”).

There is also liability for failure to provide information about the consequences of a mandatory audit or for not timely entering it into the Unified Register of the facts of a legal entity’s activities. persons: established fine from 5 to 50 thousand rubles. (Clause 6–8 of Article 14.25 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation).

For the absence of an audit report within the established storage period (from 5 years), found during an on-site tax audit, there may be a fine of 5,000 to 10,000 rubles. (Part 1 of Article 15.11 of the Administrative Code).

It should always be taken into account that the imposition of fines and sanctions does not relieve the responsible person from the obligation to perform an audit and provide a conclusion on it.

Where should the audit report for 2019 be submitted?

The audit report must be submitted to Rosstat. When the auditor's report on the annual financial statements is ready before the balance sheet is submitted, it can be submitted with the financial statements.

It follows from this that the audit report for 2018 must be submitted to Rosstat no later than December 31, 2019.

For 2018, the tax audit report is submitted only at the request of the tax service.

The annual financial statements, together with the audit report for 2019, will be submitted only to the tax authority at the location of the company in the form of an electronic document. In 2020, there is no need to submit either reports or conclusions to Rosstat!

The period for submitting annual reports to the Federal Tax Service remains the same: no later than 3 months after the end of the reporting period, as a rule, the deadline for submitting reports is April 1.

The conclusion on the mandatory audit for 2019 must be submitted to the tax office in electronic form along with the accounting record. reporting or within 10 working days after the date of issue of the conclusion. The deadline is no later than December 31 of the following reporting year (Article 18 of Law No. 402-FZ).

The next version of Article 18 of the Law on Accounting comes into force in 2020; the transfer of financial statements in 2019 (for 2018) will be carried out as before - to the statistical authorities.

Therefore, the annual financial statements and audit report for 2019 need to be submitted only to the tax authorities - already next year, 2020.

The amount of the fine and sanctions will depend on whether a mandatory audit was necessary?

If there was a need, then the fine, as a rule, will be much larger.

Thus, sanctions for the audit report for 2019 (failure to provide it) will increase significantly. In this regard, we ask you to be careful and do not forget to carry out the audit on time!

Type of violations according to the 2019 Accounting Reports in the Federal Tax Service, fines under Article 15.11.1 of the Code of Administrative Offences.

1). Failure to submit accounting reports or submitting them in full - a fine of 50-70 thousand for officials, 100-200 thousand for legal entities;

2) Failure to submit audited reports and AZ or submitting them incompletely - a fine of 80-100 thousand for an official, 300-500 thousand for legal entities.

3) Failure to submit accounting reports by December 31 of the following reporting year - a fine of 80-100 thousand for officials, 200-300 thousand for legal entities.

4) Failure to submit audited reports and AZ by December 31 - a fine for officials of 100-200 thousand, for legal entities - 500-700 thousand rubles.

When to conclude an audit agreement for 2019?

It must be remembered that the audit is carried out not only for statistics and the tax office! First of all, the owners of the company need an audit study in order to assess to what extent they can trust the financial statements and make the right management decisions.

Most statutory audit entities are required to carry out annual audits in accordance with established Russian laws. The audit must be objective, confirming the reliability of the specified data in the financial accounting statements, the transparency and correctness of accounting and tax accounting in accordance with the norms established by law. This is an indicator of the stable and orderly operation of companies. A mandatory audit every year from our company Audit Expert LLC is carried out by most companies - this is the implementation of audit procedures in accordance with current requirements and methods. This analysis is carried out by highly qualified specialists who, based on the results of the work done, present to their clients a detailed audit report and report on the work done at the end of the study.

If your company is subject to a mandatory audit, and you conduct it (having received an opinion), then you will comply with the requirements of the law. But you need to understand that mandatory auditing is not a panacea for all vulnerabilities and errors. This fact is due to the fact that a statutory audit assumes that the research is carried out only to express an opinion on the reliability of the accounting (financial) statements. Thus, tax reporting is also checked, i.e. only from the point of view of reliability.

This approach does not provide you with protection from tax risks and tax overpayments. In the practice of Audit Expert LLC, the detection of such cases is not uncommon, incl. and in enterprises that previously conducted mandatory audits.

For example, organizations often do not accrue reserves for doubtful debts and for vacation pay in accounting and tax accounting. During the audit, our experts explain in detail:

— how to correctly calculate these reserves, which helps to significantly reduce the amount of income tax,

— and also prevent additional taxes and penalties.

According to our experience, we help reduce tax risks in every second company. What if your company overpays or underpays taxes?

It is important to note that a statutory audit is an audit only at the end of the audited year. Therefore, when they remember about the mandatory audit, it is no longer possible to prevent errors in a timely manner and find solutions to the company’s financial problems. In many cases, “after the fact”, after the end of the reporting year, nothing can be changed. But if you conclude an audit agreement in advance before the end of the year, our auditors will have time to identify all potential errors, and your accountant will submit correct financial statements for 2019. The date of conclusion of the contract has virtually no effect on the price of the audit - but pre-audited statements will have virtually no accounting errors. And the audit report will most likely be positive!

Do not delay in choosing an audit company; sign an audit agreement in advance - before the end of the reporting year.