A company’s major customers are in a specialised line of business which complicates the recording of invoices for purchases. The auditor attempted to confirm several of their balances by means of a positive request and received a 15 per cent response rate.

The audit senior contacted the debtors by telephone and discovered that it would be impossible for them to confirm the balance as at their supplier's year end. This suggests that the replies received to the confirmation requests have been made recklessly. The audit partner’s response to the query raised by the audit senior regarding the evidence obtained to support this part of the debtors sample was ‘My files contain their written confirmations. I do not need to worry whether they signed them recklessly or not.’

State whether you agree with the audit partner’s attitude. If an unqualified report was issued and the debtors figure was later found to be incorrect, could the partner be accused of negligence?