Properly understanding what skills the audit committee and your internal audit department have and what tasks they can effectively perform is key to determining the need to outsource certain procedures to maintain the audit committee’s overall effectiveness in meeting its goals.
For instance, the internal audit department may be highly skilled at loan audits but doesn’t have the skills to complete a bank secrecy act (BSA) audit. BSA audits are commonly outsourced due to specialized skills, high level of examiner scrutiny, and number of hours to complete.