The condition of not having undertaken more than six consecutive years of audit work for the same CIIOs and CIIs, applies to external audit firms, internal audit department and the individual auditor.
For the avoidance of doubt, any break of 12 or more consecutive months in audit period will reset the calculation of the six consecutive years. To illustrate this, if an internal audit department had conducted audit work for CII A1 for CIIO A for 6 consecutive years of audit period following the date of designation of CII A1, a break of at least 12 continuous months of audit period would be required before the internal audit department’s application to undertake further audit work on CII A1 for CIIO A can be considered. During the break, CIIO A should engage external audit firm(s) to conduct the further audit work on CII A1 for at least 12 continuous months of audit period.
Similarly, if an external audit firm had conducted audit work for CII A1 for CIIO A for 6 consecutive years of audit period following the date of designation of CII A1, a break of at least 12 continuous months of audit period would be required before the external audit firm’s application to undertake further audit work on CII A1 for CIIO A can be considered. During the break, CIIO A should engage another external audit firm or have its internal audit team conduct the audit work on CII A1