1-The following situations have arisen in your audit firm: (1) The directors of Hilal plc have approached your firm and requested that it tender for the audit of Hilal plc. The directors hinted that in future also they will hire for additional consultancy work which is likely to be on-going. (2) The directors of Gamal Ltd, an existing audit client, have requested that an employee of your firm, who has been involved in the audit of Gamal Ltd in previous years, is seconded to the company to assist with the preparation of the monthly management accounts and the annual financial statements while the company's accountant is on maternity leave. REQUIRED Identify the potential threats to independence and suggest how the firm might deal with them. Q2 - Basam Ltd, assembles of computers from bought-in components, has experienced problems with the quality and specification of components. It was also discovered that one of the suppliers, who was related to an employee in the buying department, was overcharging the company. The managing director, Mr Waleed Al Hashmi, is considering whether the auditors were negligent in not uncovering these errors and irregularities. He has requested that your firm undertakes a detailed independent review of Basam Ltd's procurement processes in order to establish any shortcomings in its policies and procedures, so that they can be improved. wants a system which will guarantee that the errors and irregularities, will not happen again and has asked your firm to recommend improvements which will assure him of this. REQUIRED Write a letter to Mr Waleed Al Hashmi which: (a). explain the responsibilities of management and auditors in relation to the design and operation of systems and controls; and (b). explains why your firm cannot provide absolute assurance that a system of internal control will be effective in preventing all errors and irregularities. Q3-Bardwell is a privately owned incorporated business that operates a garage which repairs and services motor vehicles. Most customers are required to pay by cash or cheque on collecting their vehicle. Credit accounts are available to business customers. These customers sign the invoice on collection of the vehicle and their business is billed monthly. Separate series of prenumbered invoices are drawn up by the foreman for cash sales and for credit sales. All customer accounts are maintained by the receptionist. His duties include the following: Cash sales Collect cash or cheques from customers on collecting their vehicle. At the end of the day, check the numerical sequence of cash sales invoices, add the sales total and agree the total to the amount of cash and cheques received. Record the total cash sales in the cash receipts book. Credit sales Obtain the customer's signature on the copy invoice of business account customers. Enter the invoices in numerical sequence in the sales journal and post the customer's account in the accounts receivable ledger. Send monthly statements to credit account customers and follow up overdue accounts. List the balances on the accounts receivable ledger at the end of the month and reconcile the total with the control account in the general ledger. Write off uncollectible balances to bad debts. Cash receipts Open the mail, extract cheques from credit account customers, record them in the cash receipts book and post the accounts receivable ledger. Make up the day's banking of cash (and cheques) from both cash and credit sales, prepare the deposit slip and bank the cash (and cheques). All other accounting duties are the responsibility of two further accounts clerks and all are subject to supervision by the garage manager. REQUIRED (i) Explain why the functions assigned to the receptionist result in an inadequate segregation of duties. Your explanation should identify misstatements that could occur and indicate how those duties could be reassigned to other staff members; 2 (ii) Identify other control procedures you would consider necessary to ensure the completeness of the recorded cash receipts and accounts receivable